Miss Illustrated

The curmudgeonly Miss Representation is a firm believer that a thousand words is worth well more than a picture. Not once in the fabled misanthropic history of this verbose blog has a photo ever been posted. (I think it’s safe to say it’ll never happen either.) So, as a public service to befuddled readers everywhere, I present to you Miss Illustrated, a visual companion to the blogosphere’s favorite architecture and urban issues criticism blog.

Today’s edition is an accompaniment to this mornings post on LES street art:

Two recent street sightings remind me what’s great about this town and that ’street art’ isn’t simply something designed to end up on a Threadless tee shirt:

1. At Forsyth and Stanton (maybe Rivington), both the north and south crossing signals (east side) have stickers affixed to them that, upon the illumination of the ‘walk’ signal, transform into a Lucha Libre character (and different ones at that). Cut so they are wearing the prototypical unitard, the lights create suspenders and fill out the mask. Viewing angle is important for the full effect.

Threadless tee-shirt.

Altered crossing signal by Thundercut.

2. On one of the support columns of the Williamsburg Bridge as you travel down Delancy (right about Columbia Street) there is a hasty, sloppy testament to “Senator Chuck Schumer”. No context, no image, no additional message. Just in case you forgot, I guess, who is the senior senator from New York.

Senator Chuck Schumer

Originally uploaded by satanslaundromat.

Williamsburg Bridge graffitti, courtesy Satan’s Laundromat (on Flickr).

Senator Chuck Schumer himself, courtesy Eliot Shepard (on Flickr).