For the walking tour, I decided to walk around Little Italy to look for street art. I found a lot of small murals and paintings that I decided to photograph for the tour but will only be specifying five of them.
We will start the tour at the corner of Spring Street and Mulberry St, we will continue walking on Spring St and we will take a right on Mott Street. After, we will take a right on Kenmare St to go back to Mulberry St and continue down that street to see the remaining murals.
- Shark Drinking beer
This mural of a Shark drinking beer was painted by artist Anthony Zito and It’s located on the corner of Spring St and Mulberry St. He is known for painting portraits on walls and has many other murals around the city. The Shark is painted on the side of the Spring Lounge better known as the Shark bar. He also painted the mural outside of Lombardi’s of the Monalisa holding a pizza on the other side of the corner of Spring St.
The use of the three primary colors: Red for the sides, blue for the shark and yellow for the beer makes this piece very interesting and eyecatching. The way the shark interacts with the black background gives it a 3D effect like it’s coming out of the wall.
2. NoodleLove mural
This wall has been home to many murals during the years, now this beautiful mural painted by Borzu is the one we can appreciate. It is located on the corner of Kenmare Street and Mott Street. Painted on the side of Noodle love restaurant this wall has had art done by Kelsey Montage and Fer Da Silva. Muralist and visual artist Borzu painted this mural in 2019. The artist plays with the figures of the two people with a noodle in between them and breaks the piece with geometrical forms and different bright colors.
3. Audrey Hepburn
The Audrey Hepburn mural was painted in August 2013 by Tristan Eaton. He is a lollipop artist, street art muralist, and toy designer. This mural was painted for the Little Italy Street Art Project and The Little Italy Merchants Association on the outside of Cafe Roma. These projects hope to attract more tourists to the Little Italy area in the hope to save the small restaurants and shops from the progressive Chinatown growth.
It’s located at the entrance of Little Italy, on Mulberry Street. It’s a graffiti of actress Audrey Hepburn mixed with colorful and very detailed pop-art swirls. It brings so much color to this block which is mainly brick and dark red color. I love the geometrical pattern it offers mixed with the more realistic black and white part of the portrait. It gives it a collage effect that is very interesting to see on a wall.
4. Cursum Perficio
Located on 163 Mulberry Street, Cursum Perficio is a mural painted by Beau Stanton also for The L.I.S.A. Project (Little Italy Street art). Cursum Perficio means “My journey is over” in Latin, it alludes to the neighborhood’s rich history of immigration and the area which once was a place where Italians settled after coming to New York City. The number of details in this piece is outstanding, it looks like a print rather than a painted wall and the bright aqua colors bring life to the walls of the area. It is located at 163 Mulberry Street.
5. Mona Lisa in Little Italy
Painted by James Reka at the end of 2016 is a mural of a personalized Mona Lisa. Reka transforms a very famous painting into one of his own. The circular and oval shapes construct a very particular piece and the earth tones contrast with the blue of the restaurant where is painted. This mural is located on 132 Mulberry Street on the side of Umberto’s Clam House and was also a part of the L.I.S.A project.
Conclusion
The easiest aspect to explain through a walking tour is to describe things you can see. All the murals above are physical objects you can appreciate by walking through the neighborhood and seeing them first hand. I think that it’s easier to describe something that people can see that something they can’t like a sensation or a feeling. The experience of being on the streets of Little Italy and perceiving all that history through art, sight, smell, sound, and touch is something very hard to describe so it’s preferable to be there to feel it.
I think that street art is very relevant to a community. In this case not only represents the history or relationships of the neighborhood but it was a project to help the people that created this beautiful place. Street art changes a lot over time and deteriorates throughout the years. It’s very sad to see some pieces fade away and others covered by new buildings constructed on the site. I spent a lot of time looking for a particular mural I wanted to see and it took me a while to realize that the new building I was standing in front of was where the mural used to be. That’s why I think street art encapsulates a distinct time and place of history and we should support art to fill our streets with color and magic.
