Opening this past weekend and running through June 30th is Seattle artist Mike Leavitt's "New York Art Army" show. Hand-made action figures were created to visually tell the history of the city's creative scene, the wooden New Yorkers stand alongside other "urban art stars and old masters." Fittingly, the show (exhibited in a site-specific installation) is across the street from the ToyTokyo toy shop, at their Showroom. more ›

This must be what happens when the Euro is strong and the U.S. dollar is weak. It turns out that 70% of elaborate subway car graffiti is created by Europeans. The Daily News puts this on the cover, noting that many taggers from "from Germany, Italy, France, Spain, Switzerland, Denmark and Norway to spray-paint their murals and elaborate tags - called "pieces" - on trains, fully aware that the Transit Authority will scrub them clean within hours." Why? So they can photograph their work to give them some NYC street cred back home! The Daily News has a great quote from Lady Pink, who says that New York taggers aren't interested in tagging trains: "Painting to take a photograph, for us who live here, is kind of the wussy way out. The point is to have it run [on the tracks and be seen]." more ›

-- Jewish lifeguards are being discriminated against at Jones Beach. Opines Krucoff: "I suggest sending in the IDF to secure the beach." more ›

Yesterday's gorgeous day was the perfect setting for Marc Ecko's graffiti street party to celebrate the release of his video game, Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure. However, the party became a minor First Amendment cause celebre as City Councilman Peter Vallone successfully started a wave to get the party permit revoked, only to have a judge rule the party must go on. Newsday called it a throwback to the '80s with boomboxes, breakdancing and graffiti, and Ecko told reporters, "It's about art but they used an old tool of fear-mongering, a political thing, trying to lean on family values, using graffiti as a negative when it's really just a bunch of young people getting together to express themselves." more ›

City Councilman Peter Vallone, who seems to have unofficially tagged (hee) himself the anti-graffiti Council member, wants the city to stop a permit for graffiti artists to tag subway car replicas, according to the NY Post. The party is for Atari's new game, Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure, and people associated with the event tell the Post that Vallone is hypocritical, since one of the artists, Lady Pink, participating had been commissioned by Vallone to create a mural. There's also a quote from Animal magazine's Bucky Turco, who has been keeping an eye on Vallone's anti-graf remarks: "To actually try to stop the event is paramount to censorship, which is worse than graffiti. I really think this guy is using graffiti as a soapbox. I don't think he can get into the press for anything else." more ›