Boxer

Sticker found on a lamp post near P.S. 1 in Long Island City. The museum is in the same neighborhood as a lot of artist's studios and is a magnet for this sort of thing.

The Bush Regime Engineered 9-11

Who killed our 3000 brothers and sisters on September 11?

Was the Titanic an inside job?

What is the connection between the Vatican, the Roosevelt administration and the 1906 San Francisco earthquake?

Who really shot President McKinley and why did they name a mountain after him?

Leviticus - Part 9

Another from the crayon series found near Union Square.

I've also been noticing post-it notes with the Freestyle Family double F taped up around downtown.

Dakota

Found in Washington Square Park wheat pasted to a lamp post. The image is an architecural detail of the famous apartment building.

Nice, right?

Posted in the Bleecker Street area by If You Don't Know, a website whose stated purpose is " to take control of our public space by promoting racial, social and economic consciousness; to take back our public space and combat the infiltration of commercial propaganda with messages that will liberate the minds of the members of our communities and reshape the value system distorted by commercialization and materialism, helping to redirect our priorities toward things which will promote a more prosperous and long lasting form of economic development of our community, such as education and self empowerment."

It's time for Advertising 101. This flyer uses what is called borrowed interest - that is putting something sensational and irrelevant in an ad to rope in a reader. This example uses sex. You can tell that a woman's bust has nothing to do with at-risk young men by putting any other message after the lead in:

Nice, right? You know what else would be nice?

$99 round trip fares to Rome.
The New York Times delivered free for one week.
Anal Holocaust live in Stockton.

The worst part is that this is a PSA, a category which ad creatives love because it gives them a good chance to scoop up awards. If You Don't Know wants to combat ad industry messages with their own but first they have to learn how to create print that is just as compelling.

Squatter Films

I think of squatters as part of gentrification. They're a subset of the artsy types who transform a bad neighborhood into prime real estate. Squatters see it differently judging from the hyperbolic "gentrification is genocide" claim on this flyer.

It also states "Squatting is about taking back life, taking back the land in the interest of justice, equality, peace and love between neighbors..." I disagree. Squatting is about economics, wanting to live in NYC and not wanting to pay a high rent.

SPC. Brandon Jacob Rowe

Posters found in the West Village, recording the date of death and age of a U.S. soldier, presumably a casualty of the Iraq War. Uncle Sam could either be repeating his "I want you" message or singling out the viewer as responsible for Rowe's death.

Reward $1000 Cash

This is the second lost dog flyer I've found in my neighborhood in a week. I suspect that there's a dognapper loose. All the more reason to boycott Saigon Grill.

What Money Can Buy

Found in the subway. This is the sermon, preserving the emphasis:

WHAT MONEY CAN BUY
Money Will Buy
A bed BUT NOT sleep.
Books BUT NOT brains.
Food BUT NOT appetite.
Finery BUT NOT beauty.
A House BUT NOT a home.
Medicine BUT NOT health.
Luxuries BUT NOT culture.
Amusement BUT NOT happiness.
A crucifix BUT NOT a Savior.
A church pew BUT NOT heaven.

The rest is an appeal to let Jesus be your savior.

Seeing how many churches in NYC are being converted into luxury condos, it looks like Jesus is literally losing ground to dead presidents.

On 12th Street between 3rd and 4th Avenues. You can see already how the remains of the church will be completely overwhelmed by the building behind it.

The Christian Scientists will remain on the bottom floor but the upper floors will be residences.

On West 4th Street between 6th Avenue and Washington Square Park. God just can't afford to live in this neighborhood anymore.

Lost Dog

Most lost pet flyers are sad but this one is downright jaunty. The only sign of desperation is that the $1000 reward sticker has been placed over the original amount of $700.

Leviticus - Part 8

Two pieces by Leviticus found on Park Avenue South just north of Union Square. The uniting theme is the use of crayons.

The first one I found is a portrait on a page torn from a sketchbook.

The second is a page from a coloring book of Bible stories. The story concerns Joseph bringing his family back to Egypt.

The skull superimposed over Joseph's face and genital -like shapes over the bodies of both figures suggest a sex-death motif while the riot of color is an allusion to Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

Rites of Privacy

My wife is a performer and she has told me that I should physically restrain her from putting on a one-man-show.

David Rhodes doesn't have anyone like me in his life.

Martha's Dance Center

From the Polish neighborhood in Greenpoint Brooklyn. I kept this for the weird illustration.

CSI:New York

This is another Jews for Jesus flyer trying to be relevant, this time by borrowing interest from the popular CSI television series.

The premise is "What do you think Mac Taylor and his CSI colleagues would have done if they had to investigate the Death of Y'shua (the Jewish way to say Jesus)? Who would they pin the murder on?"

Then it goes on to work in every character from the show as they review the facts of the case as described in the Bible.



The biggest flaw in hypothetical situation is that the NYPD would have no reason to investigate this case. No murder was committed. It would be like looking into someone who was sentenced to death in Iran. Their legal system doesn't work like ours does, and we may disapprove of it, but it's out of our jurisdiction.


The flyer concludes with "the evidence points to all of us being guilty, since anyone who ever sinned put put Y'shua on the cross."

Uh...no. No New York judge would ever convict someone for a murder committed two thousand years before he was born. At least I hope not. I don't want to take the fall for what happened to Saint Bartholomew.