Lower East Side

Manhattan's Lower East Side has been home to waves of immigrants for at least one hundred-fifty years.  I had the good fortune to live there during the late 1980s and early 90s.  The daily pageant of different cultures was a great inspiration.  Here I painted a landmark synagogue, at the time boarded up, though bound for eventual restoration.  My area was a Puerto Rican neighborhood which was giving way to a trickle of Mexicans and waves of Chinese.  Who knows what the area will look like in fifty years...

Many of the oldest buildings have people and creatures carved on their facades. I used to lived in large rented loft at 84 Forsyth Street on the second floor, over the Po King Trading Company.   The space was over sixty feet deep, at night it was a black cavern, with the trees of Sara Roosevelt Park lit by the street lights.  If you look at the painting "84 Forsyth Street" below, you can see my cat in the window.

The Lower East Side is full of all sorts of food vendors and industries, from fish mongers to people selling watermelons on the street. History's hand lies heavy on the area, in abandoned buildings and the ghosts of demolished ones and even older history in hidden burial grounds, not active for one hundred fifty years.

Much of the artwork on this page is available for puchase. Email me for details.

Canal Street Wall,   oil on canvas 18" x 24"

Eldridge St. Synagogue

Face Building,  oil on canvas 20" x 30"

Fish store on Christie Street, oil on canvas 24" x 18"

84 Forsyth Street

Portuguese Jewish Cemetary, oil on canvas 18" x 24"

Loft Interior, Night, oil on canvas

Ruins on Forsyth Street, oil on canvas  30" x 24"

32 Saint Marks Place, oil on canvas 20" x 24"

Watermelon Truck,  oil on board 16" x 20"