A Note from Avram Finkelstein and David Zinn

It is precisely during times of emergency when artists provide touchstones to our humanness. COVID-19 is undeniably one such moment in New York, where the city that thrives on connection has been forced to avoid it, and the city’s most coveted assets—the marquees of dormant theaters, the shuttered museums, galleries, and stores—have become voiceless reminders of our isolation. 

We want to give this shared public space a voice. What if, instead of silence, it could help us meditate on the larger meanings of survival and community; on persistence, preservation, continuity, and durability? What if we assembled a group of artists to create a series of public projects in these sleeping hubs of social commerce, a transient Street Museum to remind New York of its buoyancy and originality, and to help us flex our imaginations as we re-engage with our future? 

And so, please meet Jilly Ballistic, New York City's leading subway vandal. Over the last decade, Ballistic has mounted her work in hundreds of stations and train cars, recontextualizing these shared spaces in a way that comments on the evolution of these subterranean communal spaces over the last century. For this installation, Ballistic moves above ground, succinctly connecting the dots of devastation caused by our pandemic moment.

In the artist’s own words, “It's difficult to conceptualize such large numbers, especially when those numbers are linked to something so tragic as these deaths. There's a danger, though, if we don't fully grasp the atrocity: we allow those in power to get away with murder. What better (way) for a politician to understand our pain than using money as a metaphor?” 

Avram Finkelstein and David Zinn, co-curators