Photography and words by Caroline Bach
Imagine this: an industrial neighborhood attracts the eye of some artists because of cheap rent, availability of raw material and relatively easy access to the city. These visionary artists begin to settle and transform the area, resulting in a more habitable neighborhood. This attracts the eye of a few renegade entrepreneurs and craftspeople who bring to life their own visions, supplying a few goods and services to the community. With the availability of goods and services, comes a second wave of inhabitants, who see a chance to live cheaply in a ‘bohemian’, ‘arty’ community. As property owners see more interest in their spaces, the potential to raise rent is realized and some of the artists are priced out. This growing urban population means a need for more goods and services, which are supplied by a new wave of entrepreneurs who cheaply copy the visions of the originals. More goods and services mean more people, more people means higher rent, higher rent means fewer artists, and suddenly big developers are interested. High-rise condo buildings shoot up as historical buildings crash and burn. Mom and pop shops close their doors to be reincarnated as modernly lit Asian fusion restaurants, wine bars, Duane Reades and Starbucks.
Anyone who knows Greenpoint, Williamsburg, Red Hook, Dumbo, or Long Island City knows this story — including 5 Pointz curator, Jonathan Cohen. 5 Pointz Aerosol Art Center is an outdoor graffiti exhibition space. For the past ten years, 5 Pointz has made it’s home in the 200,000 square foot factory building across from PS1. Spanning nearly an entire city block, this complex has become an iconic building of Long Island City, and houses over two hundred artists in some of the most affordable studios left in the city. The exterior walls of the Jackson Avenue warehouse are the canvases for graffiti artists from all over the world. This colorful building is one of the few left, that supplies character and charm to the neighborhood.
Jonathan Cohen, 5 Pointz founder, more commonly known by his tag, Meres One, acquired the space over ten years ago. Meres is carrying on the legacy of Pat DiLillo who founded the original project, The Phun Phactory Project in the early nineties, a space where graffiti artists could legally write and display their murals without the fear of vandalism charges. After nearly nine years of existence, The Phun Phactory closed in 2002. Eight months later it reopened in the hands of Meres as 5 Pointz, whose name signifies the coming together of the five boroughs. Meres had aspirations of not only converting part of the space into a graffiti museum, but to create the first aerosol art school with a formal curriculum, until March of 2011 when the building owner Jerry Wolkoff announced his plans to demolish the building making way for, you guessed it, high-rise condos. Wolkoff’s $350 million dollar plan includes forty story high residential towers, shops and a supermarket. These proposals threaten to destroy a cultural landmark, the scenic view from the 7 train and the the dwindling charm of Long Island City. Eleven new high-rise condo buildings with over 3,000 residential units have altered the Hunter’s Point waterfront, and shifted the character of the neighborhood in an irreversible way.
It’s easy to bill Wolkoff, as a heartless developer and enemy to artists, but this is not exactly the case. Over the past thirty years, Wolkoff has provided a space for artists at well under market value. Wolkoff developed relationships with many of the residents in the building, and saw the space as his way of giving back to the arts community. Although Wolkoff’s new plans appear to be money-driven and distasteful to many who value the old character of the neighborhood, he does plan to reserve one wall for graffiti and several studio spaces for artists. Imagine what it would be like if each of the eleven condo building owners followed the lead of Jerry Wolkoff and took some action to support the arts, or the community.
New York is not a static place and neighborhoods are always changing. Populated by one ethnicity and then the next, one economic class to the next, it is not the fate of anywhere in New York to remain the same, forever. Neighborhoods like Soho and the East Village have been completely transformed by gentrification, but the difference is the physical structure of the neighborhood remains intact. The new type of development in Brooklyn and Queens drastically alters the character and the entire neighborhood. The condo megaplexes of Long Island City and Williamsburg are insular communities that block the views. Giant towers with private gyms, shops, clubs and playgrounds create their own separate communities while the residential buildings left at their feet die out like underbrush on the forest floor. This type of development does not take into account how schools, transportation and communities are affected … It is simply development for development’s sake.
So, what is the fate of the artist community? The diaspora that once led the creative communities to Long Island City, Greenpoint, and Williamsburg will inevitably lead them to another neighborhood. One thing that we can count on is that determined creators will keep creating. When asked if he would relocate or stay and fight, Meres explained, “I’m not thinking about neither of those things. I am just focusing on the next season and making that a fun-filled summer. (I’m) trying to spread the magic of 5 Pointz to people and I think everyone should see it at least once. I’m just concentrating on that and what’s meant to unfold will unfold … but graffiti will never die.”
Click here to learn more about 5 Pointz.
