Earl’s World / Mixed Media; newspaper, styrofoam, newspaper, watercolor, video / 9” x 12” x 2 ½” / 2024

Earl’s Walk is a visual representation of the mental map he associated with his walk, including his new and eye-opening experiences as well as the physical materials, conversations, and photos/videos that he collected along the walk. Though he took paths with similar stop points, the separate walks were their own adventures of exploring something new. He was reminded of his love for nature in a predominantly skyscraper-filled city. He people-watched. He listened in on conversations that he came across and talked to strangers. Walking the whole day alone in serenity, he realized how much he was content with life and with himself in this moment.

Bumagat mentioned in his second project that he would describe his walk to a 10-year-old as an adventure of finding keys to open a treasure, which is the experience that they would immerse themselves in after the walk. For his third project, he based it on that concept, making a fun visual of his mental map including some symbols of things that stood out to him and helped make his experience what it was. The quarter in the treasure chest was one thing he wished he had during his walk. When he got to places with telescopes that allowed you to see the views, he was regretful that he wasn’t carrying any quarters with him. Putting the quarter there to start the journey allows the next person to walk without regrets and truly enjoy what is there. This walk itself was a journey of finding yourself in a third place that doesn’t revolve around work, physical home, or any stressors. It helped him be comfortable in building a new home around this new community.

Through the physical representation and vlogs of Earl’s Walk, he hopes to take you with him in that experience.

Grand Army / 2024 / DigitalIllustration (printed on photo Tex) / 12 x 48 in

Grand Army is the culmination of a series of work and inquiries revolving around the theme of memory and its unreliable qualities. This piece explores the blurred line between true memory and imagination. To people, memory is often relied upon as truth and the only existing frame of reference one has for many moments of their life. These memories are often filled with gaps and fabricated details that obscure the original truth of the situation. This work was created to represent this mixed reality from Ellie Chung’s memory of her visit to Grand Army Plaza. Painted figures crossing the plaza are representations of people she observed and drew there. The result is a crowd of existing people with imagined and falsified details that were filled in days after her visit. The background is a composite of pictures taken at the Plaza that have been manipulated to emphasize the hazy effect of memory, along with the distortion of space and setting. In Chung’s memories, the clearest details lie in the people she observed and interacted with, while the physical setting fades in clarity. Whether this perceived clarity is accurate is a separate matter, as the details that feel the most real often only feel that way due to manipulation from the mind. One may question whether the people depicted in this work should be considered the same as the people Chung saw during her walk, or if they have become someone new altogether. How much of the details of a person can be replaced before they cease to become a representation of an existing person, and instead becomes the figment of one’s imagination? The process and thinking behind this work can be viewed in Chung’s sketchbook, along with additional drawings taken from the memories of her time in New York.

theghosts i saw from hereto there / 2024 / Digitalphotography & digitalillustration printed onInstax film, sketchbook/ 9.25 x 6.5 in.

Having grown up in the city her whole life, Mila Kiran Jacobs was unable to look at the bustling NYC streets with the same fresh eyes as most of her peers. Despite the desire to focus on making new experiences, she couldn’t help but notice how polluted every block became with the memories of what had happened before. All she saw were memories of the people that she’d met, the places she’d been, and the people she had become over the years she lived here.

In her work entitled the ghosts i saw from here to there, Jacobs took note of the ghosts she saw on her walk to the park, taking their picture and drawing them back in when they inevitably didn’t show up on the photo. She then collected them into a book and added her field notes to recreate and share the experience with others who wouldn’t be able to see them

Echos /2024 / FilmPhotography / 12 x 18in. (each photo

In Greek Mythology there are creatures called nymphs which are spirits of nature that present as playful young women. A nymph is tied to a specific natural fixture such as a tree, cloud, or river, caring for and protecting their environment while also often getting mixed up with gods, goddessess, and demigods. There are countless stories of humor, romance, and tragedy involving these minor nature goddesses.

Growing up in New York City means accepting at an early age that all of the nature around you is either placed there by people or not supposed to be there. Central or Riverside park is like a forest for a little kid in Manhattan, but in reality these parks are man-made and all the wildlife is considered rodents. It is almost impossible to invission the thriving woodland that occupied this land before colonization. Any dryad, naiad, or nereid who was once tied to this environment would be long dead with their essence burried under tons of concrete.

In Echos, Janelle McNiff imagines a scene of two nymphs in and around Straus Park, a small and somewhat dirty neighborhood plot of man-made nature. They havebecome scrappy and bored as the city around them continues to eat away at their lifeforce. Like the tragic story of the nymph this photography series is named after, these spirits are only an echo of what they once were.

Recollection I / 2024 /Ink on illustration board/ 15 x 20 in.

Recollection I is a visual mapping of Joo Eon Park’s mental representation of New York City, based on the places he visited and the experiences he had during his first few weeks living in the city. He has directionally mapped the city in reference to his home in Brooklyn Heights, represented by the thick horizontal line found at the bottom right. Thinner lines, which depict the routes that he took, can be seen emerging from this point of origin, extending throughout the city and beyond. The various symbols found throughout the work symbolize different locations, based on his memories that were formed during this time. While the work is generally abstract, the symbols illustrate his viewpoint and mental images of various locations in the city, formed by his personal experiences and memories. He describes the hexagonal shape at the top left as a cyclical symbol, representing the recurrent nature of the commute to his internship in New Jersey. A target symbol is seen at the bottom right, which represents the Target store which is a 20-minute walk from his home. Following the precisely arranged lines, one can picture the various routes taken both on the subway and on foot, thinking about some of their own memories and commutes across the city

Welcome to NYC /2024 / Artist Book /3.75 x 4.25 in

Reece Stallwitz has come to the conclusion that you cannot truly expect anything from any place that you visit or live. It warps itself into different things for every individual. The building that you pass on your way to the grocery store every Thursday could be someone’s home or work place. It could be where someone is about to receive the best news of their life, or the worst. To put it simply, there is no “correct” way to describe New York City, or anywhere for that matter. Places are shaped by people, memories, and paths of desire. You cannot truly know a place and what it means to someone else, just as others cannot know what it means for you. That is what the theme of Stallwitz’s map is. It is what NYC is for her. It is the things that she notices and the things that she is trying to draw her attention to. Stallwitz plans to make this project ongoing, which is why there are so many empty pages that have yet to be filled. Her story here is not done, so neither is her book. The book starts with the map of her first two walks, but it will hopefully turn into a map of her time here in the city. She created a book because she really enjoyed doing so for her first project, with photography as her medium because she feels that it really captures the essence of fleeting time and moments. That is the heart and soul of her project because her fleeting moments are vastly different from others going through the same program as her. Different memories will be attached to each photo and getting to retell the stories behind them will ensure that the meaning behind the book never gets lost.

Holistic Map/ 2024 /Embroidery Hoop,Thread, Moss, CopperWire, Beads / diameter 7 in. x height 31 in.

The faraday cage is an enclosure used to block electromagnetic fields from interfering with what’s inside, usually made with a continuous covering or mesh of conductive materials. During phases of spiritual growth and healing from negative events in her past, Bleu was inspired by the infrastructure of NYC to gravitate towards using copper as a medium for an enclosure and map. The different lengths and adornments of the copper hangings are representative of different facets of her experience while going through this growth and their corresponding significance, closeness to her, and interconnectedness. The correlation between the observed infrastructure of NYC, the surrounding community of people, and her becoming have been the cornerstone of this piece.

Earth Tones / 2024 / DigitalPhotography, textile fabric, rocks, frames /Rocks 12 x 14 in. Prints15 x 20 in. (each

Mixing physical rocks and fabric, Earth Tones speaks to materialism in nature, and the connection between our attention to nature itself. Utilizing nature’s own adaptation of camouflage, the earth-toned fabrics almost blend into the environment in the photographs. These structures appear nearly human, placing the bodily form into nature as the cotton material almost resembles T-shirts or signs of human life. Wrapped around the rocks, they recall shapes going into the Earth as if humans are returning to nature. Agonizingly, the juxtaposition of the mirrors and fabrics alludes to human attention, and where our attention may be misplaced in reference to the environment.

Nian / 2024 / Digital photography, Inkjet print / 8 x 12 in

Chinese Lunar New Year celebration parade is always colorful and fascinating. Hammer Chen puts his lens toward the people who were trying to participate in this festival but not in the center of the stage. They were not tall enough to see the performance, they were annoyed by the loud noise of firecrackers, they were kids who had been forced to put on traditional Chinese red costumes and photos taken by their parents, and they were Hispanic parents and kids trying to sell cotton candies to make livings. Although these people appear as background to the Lunar New Year Parade, they all have some small pieces of stories that are worth documenting and showing to the world.

Day in the Life / 2024 /Video / 0:12

There are many words to describe New York city: lively, vibrant, energetic, overwhelming, full of life, diverse. But one word that no one ever mentions, is lonely. Spending a long period of time in such a crowded and overwhelming city can numb people from social connections and the thousands of people that walk past each day becomes just another body flowing through the city.

Peam Patrathiranond explores the difficulty, monotony, and loneliness of moving to New York City as an international student through his two main mediums, film and photography.

Day in the Life combines the fast-paced feeling of living in New York as well as the monotony through the video loop. The 12-second ultrashort film makes every single frame count and tests the viewer’s ability to keep up with the adrenaline and rhythmic pace of New York while giving them the opportunity to re-watch and get lost into the loop of life.

Patrathiranond’s almost endless Sketchbook gives the audience a more in-depth view into his time here in New York city and in the Art New York Program. Although less monotonous, the theme of loneliness can be seen throughout this sketchbook whether it’s through the photos, activities, or texts.

Cairns /2024 / Rocks, Acrylic paint / 5 x 11 x 11 in.

Cairns are defined as a human-made pile or mound of stones that serves as a trail marker or landmark. This pile of rocks is Ella Smith’s version of a cairn. During her time in New York City, the notion of mapping became an everyday occurrence. In order to get around, she discovered that it was the bold, bright visuals of graffiti that helped her. New York is filled with this street art. Old, crumbling buildings turn into abstract panels of color, a new surface for art. The grey concrete jungle awakens. Graffiti takes over and tells us stories of the people who stood in the same places before us. It makes us think about the importance of human interaction and influence on our environments.

Through the process of navigation, these stones were collected at each graffiti site that helped guide Smith home. A brick from a crumbling wall where a huge colorful word hung, stones from the park where benches house an array of signatures. Part of the sidewalk under a sign that was in need of more color, a piece of the road next to an expressive barricade. Each stone, painted intricately to mirror the graffiti at its original site. Stacked meditatively to carry her home. Through these cairns, we rethink the standard of beauty and alter our view on what most would think of as vandalism, as a form of beautiful expression.

Harm Reduction Awareness

Bluestocking bookstore extends its services to being a beacon of hope for the surrounding community by providing information on harm reduction and solutions, while maintaining a safe space for all. When asked about the solution to harm reduction the response given by an employee of the organization was “We need to stop being shitty,” which reads at the top of the awareness poster. The way we treat each other and the words (stigmas) that people attach to others, perpetuate negative cycles that society then places judgment on. Rather than offering solutions to these cycles, people enforce or enable them. The country itself already does many things with money & resources that may counteract the needs of American citizens; however, our relationship with one another can surpass the need for additional resources. In actuality we can provide for each other. Today, people are more focused on preserving their individuality, and those who struggle with their identity or health are further shamed, only pushing them deeper into darkness. Stigmas are one of the various reasons that will lead to harm reduction kits being used. Thus, in prevention of harming oneself, it starts with how we view each other and maintain respectable humanitarian perspectives towards others regardless of what society makes of someone. As many know, this is easier said than done. The core of the issues that people end up experiencing regarding drug use, is that people are dehumanized for being escapists. If people were more open and willing to be a shoulder to lean on perhaps, we wouldn’t have the issues that we have even in populated cities.