Posts Tagged ‘Dutch Kills neighborhood’
innermost monstrosities
I know things, I tell you, things!
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Owing to it being Columbus Day and all, one got to thinking what the old boy might have seen were he to have ever made it to Newtown Creek. Columbus, of course, never got anywhere even remotely close to NYC – but if today’s post was a thought experiment designed to picture a spot that the Dutch Kills Tributary of Newtown Creek flowed to prior to European colonization… well, 40th avenue between 29th street and 30th is a darned good place to visit. Just saying.
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headlong down
Nowhere to go, no one to talk to, like a falling autumn leaf – me.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One actually did have someplace to go last week – as a rare social occasion wherein a group of us who work for the Brownstoner Queens site commiserated over dinner and drinks in the Dutch Kills neighborhood last week. This drew me out just as the rain clouds were blowing out last Thursday night, and the sunset lighting one encountered was absolutely stellar.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This rainbow appeared over what is today the Center Building on Northern Blvd., but what was once a Ford Service Center and later offices for a large pharmaceutical company. The song “Somewhere over the rainbow” apparently refers to Sunnyside, it would seem.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This week I also have someplace to go to – I’ll be attending a meeting of the Newtown Creek CAG (Community Advisory Group), on October 1st. It’s going to be held over in Brooklyn, at the McCarren Play Center Community Room, 776 Lorimer Street, Brooklyn. I’m told that the EPA will be present. Come with?
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
any idea
A giant boulder, encountered.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
While walking through the Dutch Kills section – up 32nd street towards 36th avenue just yesterday – one encountered a giant rock. It was more of a boulder, really, it was in fact a glacial erratic.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Fairly sure am I that I would have noticed this before, given the orange safety bollards surrounding it, but I haven’t walked through here in a month or so (normally, I stick to Northern Blvd. on my way back from ye old Creek).
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Luckily, the neighborhood hereabouts seems to have embraced the erratic, adorning it in the names of nation states. No doubt, this is symptomatic of the recent World Cup tournament fever which gripped Western Queens.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One does wonder if this is some sort of manifestation of the native art form of Queens – illegal dumping – but it’s likely related to some work going on further down the street. Wonder how long this has been here without me noticing?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
When I got home and mentioned the rock to Our Lady of the Pentacle, she handed me a Union Jack flag and told me to go back and claim it for the Queen. She’s English, and that’s her people’s vibrant diversity at work. You see a never before noticed chunk of rock, anywhere, and you claim it for the Queen. I claim it for Queens instead.
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This weekend-
Sunday, August 3rd, Kill Van Kull Walking Tour
With Brooklyn Brainery, click here for tickets and more info.
chilly depths
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One of my little hobbies involves the recording of manhole covers, the large iron discs which act as a removable hatch for access tunnels to the stygian world of infrastructure that underlies the streets of New York City. Often, the cover will betray the age of the street, indicate the company or municipal organ that installed it, and provide some subtext to the relict building stock adjoins them.
This post isn’t about manholes, however, it’s about a beautiful bit of street art recently observed in the Dutch Kills neighborhood nearby the legend choked Queens Plaza.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This bit of graffiti surpasses the normal tags and scrawled affirmations common to the so called art form, due to its masterful draftsmanship and painterly quality. My own background in commercial illustration makes me a bit of snob when it comes to drawing, and this more than passes my rigid and stoic standards.
Owing allegiance more to Arisman than to Bode, this is no “cheech wizard smoking a doobie”.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Check out the wonderful contour line drawing in the elephant, and the gorgeous use of highlight and tone in the face. Nice, nice work. Whoever the artist(s) is, they have a wonderful touch. This sort of thing is normally the province of Ms. Heather at NY-Shitty, as Newtown Pentacle seldom focuses on street art, and perhaps she might be able to identify the artist.
Normally, presentation of graffitis is only engendered when it is enigmatic or curious, suggests the hidden occult, or is a blatant example of time and opportunity available at a transportation center.
The Newtown Pentacle 