An onion goes in DUMBO

Although I am not one to promote the wanton defacing of other people's property, I am certainly less willing to draw a line in the sand and create an absolute definition of what we as community should consider art. Or for that matter, where our community's art should be placed. After all, each day we are faced with much more unsettling visual clutter on our urban landscape in the form of advertising and marketing campaigns designed to drive our consumerlicious society.

OK, let me get off my high horse for a moment and walk you up to what my actual point. The point is, there are very few times in the day when I see something that makes me stop, smile or feel connected. But it happened to me yesterday while walking down Water Street (at Pearl Street) here in DUMBO when I came across a stencil of an onion on a grey door and surrounded by various tags and marks. In all cases the names of the artists was a mystery, even with the guidance of Peter Sutherland and Revs' imprint of Autograf: York Citys Graffiti Writers (Powerhouse Books), I was helpless. I suppose I am a lot less street than I tell Natasha. But, back to the point.

Was the onion art? Were the tags art? Should I know? Should I care? What I do know is that I stopped to look, frame a photo and even notice the detail of each careful cut of artists blade into the stencil. The over spray, and the under spray that gave this flat piece dimension. Overall the onion was an interesting piece, skillfully drawn and composed, but certainly a lesser piece with out the brush strokes of the hastily painted door and the poetic stylization and drips of the tags behind it.

Brilliant art or rubbish, I didn't care, it moved me, as I believe it has moved the person who today was edging ever closer to the door with a roller loaded with beige paint. You better move fast before there is no longer a point to this entry.