Street artist Aida Miro (@aidamiro) painted this vibrant Pink Ganesh, the elephant-headed Hindu God of Beginnings, back in November of 2021, but I saw it for the first time on May14th and was so happy find it untagged and looking like it was freshly painted!
According to this source, “Lord Ganesha clears all obstacles and paves the way for us to move forward in life. The large elephant head of Lord Ganesha symbolizes wisdom, understanding, and a discriminating intellect that one must possess to attain perfection in life.” Miro has also added the phrase “Rise By Lifting Others.” Sweet.
The Mural is Located in NYC’s East Village, on Sixth Street Just East of First Avenue (Next to a Duncan Donuts).
At first glance, it may appear as if this car has been vandalized, but when you really examine it from all sides, it’s pretty obvious that it’s a work of mobile street art from the artist known as Mad Steez.
In last week’s post about the Ocean Shoe, I promised to give equal time to the sculptural work that replaced it: this hyper-realistic Eyeball, from the same artist, who is known as Billy Barnacles. I hope you can appreciate my attempted cleverness in waiting patiently to get the eyeball to align with the head of the cyclist in the background. You’re welcome.
It was a dark and stormy afternoon when I first spotted this unique piece of sculpture bolted to a street sign on East 13th Street (near Ave A). I went in for a closer look:
Long-haul New Yorker’s (and East Villagers like me, especially) constantly bemoan the fact that Manhattan is becoming increasingly gentrified. The innumerable local-business closures caused by the pandemic have only exacerbated the loss of historical identity in an area that was once arguably the coolest neighborhood in NYC. When the legendary Rock & Roll boutique Trash & Vaudeville was forced to relocate from St. Mark’s Place after four decades in the same location, it really felt like nothing is sacred. It is a small conciliation then that a new contemporary art gallery, Public Access, opened this past September in the downstairs storefront formerly occupied by Trash. I recently had the chance to check out the gallery’s current exhibit, a solo show of paintings by artist Marika Thunder entitled Dress Up My Lindsay. The series has an interesting autobiographical backstory for the painter.