Art and the City
( Flickr Creative Commons )
Katie Merz, artist and professor of drawing at The Cooper Union School of Art, talks about the art she is creating for WNYC's upcoming centennial, and takes calls from listeners who share what they see as the most iconic NYC-related image, place or object.
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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. For our last 15 minutes today, yes, we have a big birthday coming up next month. On July 8th, WNYC will turn 100 years old. As part of our centennial festivities, artist Katie Merz is creating something people can see as you walk down Varick Street and pass the building we're in. We have the ground-floor theater, The Greene Space, and it has this big window. She wants your suggestions of iconic New York images to include in what she's creating. I think she's working in The Greene Space right now. If she's representing 100 years of New York City visually in a variety of ways, what iconic image might she represent in some way that comes to mind for you? Katie wants your suggestions, 212-433-WNYC.
Katie joins us now live from The Greene Space. By way of background, Katie Merz is a lifelong Brooklyn resident, as well as an award-winning artist and professor of drawing at Cooper Union. She's known for large-scale murals on buildings around the world. Her bio cites New York City, Mexico City, Denver, Austin, Lisbon at the International Design Building there, and many other places. She even once did a series of sketches of public radio people, including me, without knowing what we look like and sent them to us. Mine was hilarious. Katie also has a PhD in Humane Letters from Ursinus College following the creation of the Ursinus smokestack, which was completed in 2020. Hi, Katie.
Katie Merz: Hi. How are you?
Brian Lehrer: Good. Where are you right now?
Katie Merz: In The Greene Space lobby, actually sitting on the floor.
Brian Lehrer: Amazing. Is it empty? We don't have like 100 audience members there, just you and a microphone or phone?
Katie Merz: That's it. I don't see anybody else.
Brian Lehrer: Have you started this already in The Greene Space window?
Katie Merz: Yes. I started and I am doing both red and white covering, I think six giant panes of glass that are in downstairs and yes, it started out about an hour ago, so I'm ready to roll.
Brian Lehrer: You're ready to roll. You're going to work even while calls are coming in. What's there already visually?
Katie Merz: What's there already? There's the Brooklyn Bridge, there's the old NYC Transmitter, there's the Municipal Building, there's a rat, there's the Gowanus, there's some of the BQE. There's a lot of smattering of New York icons.
Brian Lehrer: I'll just mention that since you mentioned the rat, you've tapped into what I think so far is the most frequently mentioned suggestion of iconic New York images in the text messages that we're getting. One of them says-
Katie Merz: Oh, really?
Brian Lehrer: -a pizza rat is an appropriate New York City Icon.
Katie Merz: Oh, my god.
Brian Lehrer: Others just say rats. Let's see what George in Manhattan has to say, which is going to be completely different from that. Hi, George.
George: Hi. Good morning. I'd like to nominate Tin Pan Alley, the birthplace of American popular music on 28th Street between Broadway and Sixth Avenue, where sheet music publishers, songwriters and performers congregated to create the popular music industry that we know today. In addition to popular music and the Great American Songbook birth, it also represents immigrant history with the Eastern European Jewish immigrants and African American publishers, performers, and songwriters. It's a double win plus preservation and landmarking.
Brian Lehrer: Nice, George, a lot of stuff rolled in there. Katie, what about the arts? Have you thought of representing the entertainment, the arts industry in New York as an artist?
Katie Merz: Absolutely. I think any very basic everyday icon, which includes the arts, a record player both old and new. I think everything is included in this. Because these six panes of glass are like the world. It's like New York World. Every experience or everything that you do, a museum, something in a museum, this all can be included in the windows. There's no hierarchy here.
Brian Lehrer: Kaitlyn in Harlem, you're on WNYC. Hi Kaitlyn.
Kaitlyn: Hi there. Thanks so much for taking my call. I'm moved to share that I think a land acknowledgment image that we're on Lenapehoking Manna-hata is, I guess the name of this place. I'm not an Indigenous person myself, but there are folks doing great work at the Lenape Center who probably have a really particular image. I think it would just be a beautiful celebration of place for WNYC to really make that acknowledgment really vibrant and visible.
Brian Lehrer: That's wonderful. We've had a guest on the show from the Lenape Center of New York. What about a land acknowledgment? You know what that is, right, Katie?
Katie Merz: Yes. I think this is a great suggestion that you've phoned in with and I think words are also-- a lot of words are in the window right now, so it can be words and objects. I'm just going to include all of that. If you have words that you want to phone in as well, that would be great.
Brian Lehrer: Is part of the goal to represent 100 years in time since this is part of our centennial celebration, not just a variety of great New York images of today?
Katie Merz: Absolutely. I had a tour of the archive the other day, an NYC archive, and it was phenomenal. There were old microphones, pictures of Fiorello La Guardia. There were so many things and 100 years of radio on Wikipedia. It's nonstop information. That is going to be mixed in with old and new New York icons. There could be Ebbets Field, there could be the Parachute Jump, and then that is all knitted in to WNYC iconography and radio iconography. It's 100 years encapsulated really.
Brian Lehrer: Building on the rat theme, someone else writes, "If a rat, how about the union's protest inflatable rat- [laughs]
Katie Merz: Obviously.
Brian Lehrer: -which people throw up when there's a picket line?" Someone else suggests--
Katie Merz: Or a flat--
Brian Lehrer: I'm sorry, go ahead, Katie. What?
Katie Merz: Or a flattened rat like I see when I'm riding my bike all the time.
Brian Lehrer: Ooh.
Katie Merz: No, I know.
Brian Lehrer: I don't ever want to run over a rat on my bike. I think that the rat is going to get the best of it. Another listener writes, "The Wooden Water Tower identifies this place as New York City."
Katie Merz: That's fantastic. These are great because I get tired of improving off my own lists, so I need as much help as I can get in terms of remembering these icons.
Brian Lehrer: You've come to the right place for creative thinking, The Brian Lehrer Show audience. Alistair in Manhattan, you're on WNYC. Hi, Alistair.
Alistair: Hi. I had a friend from Toronto visit me recently and we were just thinking about some New York icons. He said the thing that he remembers most about New York is food like pizza, the dirty water dogs. He used to remember knishes which they don't really sell any more on street carts.
Katie Merz: Oh, yes. Absolutely. Knishes, pizza, hot dogs, pretzels. It goes on and on, but this is great. I'm writing it down as you're calling in and it's going to go right onto the window when I leave. These are fantastic.
Brian Lehrer: That is great, Alistair. Thank you very much. Now can you take your phone outside The Greene Space? I think part of the idea here, I don't know if it's actually doable, was that you were going to start actually doing some of the creation of these images even while we're taking some more suggestions. Is that just too much multitasking to bear?
Katie Merz: No, no, no. I'm out here with my markers and I'm doing the knish right now.
Brian Lehrer: Talk about a quick response.
Katie Merz: It's instant. This is New York in a nutshell. I just did a three-dimensional knish and it has a little smoke coming out the top and a little food cart, like the [unintelligible 00:09:15] carts.
Brian Lehrer: That is hilarious. This is like art improv. The listeners throw something out and you do it. What's your medium?
Katie Merz: Well, that's like your day in--
Brian Lehrer: Yes, go ahead.
Katie Merz: That's your day in New York, art improv is basically--
Brian Lehrer: Is marker your medium?
Katie Merz: Yes. For this on the window, it's marker. Usually, it's an oil stick, but today it is marker and the rat is up right now. I made it three-dimensional, so it's the inflatable one. Okay, what's next? The rat is done.
Brian Lehrer: The rat is done. The knish is done. I wish I had- -a streaming camera so I could see this and do play-by-play. Kasim in Harrison, New York. You're on WNYC. Hi, Kasim.
Kasim: Hi, Brian. Thank you for your great programs all over.
Brian Lehrer: Thank you, sir.
Kasim: I think a statue of liberty, but three hands or four hands holding it. A woman hand, an office worker hand, and an industrial working hand, which also represents really the NPR work of men and women and technicians and persons like you who bring the truth to multifaceted issues.
Brian Lehrer: That's very generous, Kasim, and what a concept, a Statue of Liberty with multiple hands representing different kinds of workers, if I understood him correctly or different kinds of people, a woman's hand, he said, an office worker's, and an industrial worker's hand. That's a hard one to do, right?
Katie Merz: Well, I'm in the middle of it and-
Brian Lehrer: What?
Katie Merz: -I think I'm bringing it down because I have two hands up now. I have another hand. It's like math. I'm making a math problem out of this. I have four hands drawn, and then it's really hard to get the Statue of Liberty so that it doesn't look hokey, but I'll try to minimize my drawing on that one. So it's almost done.
Brian Lehrer: Angela in Detroit, you're on WNYC. Hi, Angela. What you got about New York?
Angela: Hi, Brian. I listen every day from here. I love your show. I think my favorite building in New York City is the Flat Iron, and I was thinking the critters of New York City. I was thinking a pigeon, maybe from a bird's-eye view looking down at the Flat Iron. I was thinking-- you said the rat, but did you say the pizza rat? Because I think it's the pizza rat we need, running by with a slice of pizza. Flaco the owl should be nearby somewhere because we love Flaco.
Brian Lehrer: Wonderful ones Angela. Do you have any creatures other than humans yet in mind? Are you doing the owl now even as we speak? Are you done with Flaco? I expect you to do Flaco in like 12 seconds, Katie.
Katie Merz: Flaco is done, Brian. I'm inserting a piece of pizza into the rat that I drew about 15 minutes ago. I'm drawing a piece of pizza in. It looks like he has a long tongue, but I'm trying to correct this as we speak. Flaco came up a lot, and dogs, and pigeons.
Brian Lehrer: This is hilarious. We don't have time for any more calls, but do you want to give people a way, or is this it, a way to continue to give you suggestions for what to include in our Greene Space window centennial visual celebration?
Katie Merz: Yes, the centennial. I'm down in Varick and Charlton, and my assistant Violet has a fake mic and a clipboard. She will take notes and I'll put it up right away.
Brian Lehrer: Oh, that's for right now? Yes.
Katie Merz: Yes, and I'll be here all week. You can come by or possibly call in somehow and leave your icon as a suggestion.
Brian Lehrer: Usually the comedian's last line, in this case, the artist's, "I'll be here all week," says artist Katie Merz. Listeners, walk by to The Greene Space at WNYC's-- the building we're in at Varick and Charlton in Lower Manhattan, if you like. Katie, I can't wait to see the finished product. Thanks for coming on the show. This was unbelievable.
Katie Merz: You're welcome. I think you're in here too, Brian, all of a sudden.
Brian Lehrer: Uh-oh. Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Stay tuned for All Of It.
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