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Posts Tagged ‘Dreamland Artist Club’

Bruce Handy’s Photo Album: Doomed Dreamland Artist Club Mural

Posted in art, Photo Album, tagged Bruce Handy, Coney Island, demolition alert, Dreamland Artist Club, Jones Walk, mural, Rita Ackermann on January 25, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Over the weekend ATZ contributing photographer and Coney Island resident Bruce Handy/”Pablo 57″ took some lyrical photos of the Rita Ackermann mural. The artwork is on the west wall of the soon-to-be demolished Feltman’s Building. You can view the complete flickr set as a slideshow here.

Freaky Sideshow Girls: Detail of Dreamland Artist Club Mural by Rita Ackermann on the soon-to-be Demolished Feltman’s Kitchen (Home of the Hot Dog), Coney Island. Photo © Bruce Handy/Pablo 57 via flickr

As ATZ reported last week in “Nathan Slept Here! Coney Island’s Feltman’s Kitchen Set for Demolition” (January 19, 2010), the last remnant of the hot dog inventor’s empire is set to be demolished to make way for new amusements on the City-owned “Parcel A”—the former Astroland site. The Ackermann mural, which was valued at $250K by Dreamland Artist Club founder Steve Powers, is likely to be demolished along with the building. (“Demolition Alert: Dreamland Artist Club Mural on Feltman’s Bldg“)

Photographing the mural wasn’t an easy job, but somebody had to do it. ATZ found very few pix of this mural on the web. We’re grateful that Bruce Handy documented details of the Jones Walk artwork before it is gone forever. Bruce used a tripod and held the camera up in the air to take a photo of the complete mural.

“The problem is the mural is in a bad spot for a good photo,” says the photographer. “It’s too high and the angle is bad. To get a good photo you need a zoom lens standing on W 12th, but you also need a straight line of sight. You need to be perpendicular to the wall that’s why you need to be so far away. The ideal photo would be if someone drove a car up there and stood on the roof. That’s how Ansel Adams got all his great photos.”

Dreamland Artist Club Mural by Rita Ackermann on the soon-to-be demolished Feltman’s Kitchen (Home of the Hot Dog), Coney Island. Photo © Bruce Handy/Pablo 57 via flickr

Demolition Alert: Dreamland Artist Club Mural on Feltman’s Bldg

Posted in art, Redevelopment, tagged Coney Island, Creative Time, demolition alert, Dreamland Artist Club, Feltman's Kitchen, Rita Ackermann, Steve Powers on January 21, 2010| Leave a Comment »

In our recent post about Coney Island’s soon-to-be-demolished Feltman’s kitchen, one of the photos taken from Jones Walk shows the mural on the west wall of the historic building. Take another look because the Rita Ackermann mural is said to be worth $250,000 and the building is not long for this world. Yesterday the City’s contractors were observed removing the roof of the hot dog inventor’s kitchen.

Mural on west wall of Feltman's Kitchen Seen from Jones Walk. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

Ackermann painted the mural in 2004 for the Dreamland Artist Club says the art project’s founder and lead artist Steve Powers.

“I co-curated the Dreamland Artist Club and have happy memories of working with Rita,” Powers told ATZ. “Although I would estimate the value of the mural at $250,000, it is but a fraction of what Steeplechase Park, Luna Park and a hundred other monuments in Coney Island have been worth. The mural may meet its doom but its memory will remind us how dumb progress can be sometimes.”

It’s ironic that public art which was created in response to real estate development changing the landscape and character of Coney Island is itself endangered by redevelopment. Powers teamed up with Creative Time, the non-profit public art agency, to bring artists to Coney Island to create new signage for the stands along the Walk and the Bowery. The first year’s funding was $80,000. When the murals and signage debuted in June 2004, Powers told the Times: “A large percentage of them will be up forever.” Powers own work, including the Cyclone roller coaster seats and “Bump Your Ass Off” signs for the Eldorado Bumper Cars are thankfully still with us and look like they’ve been here forever.

Detail of Rita Ackermann Mural and Wonder Wheel Signage.. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

The Brooklyn Rail’s review of the Dreamland Artist Club included this description of Ackermann’s mural: “With an aura of danger and seduction, snake charmers, acrobats, and sword throwers return to Coney Island in Rita Ackermann’s 50-foot mural above Jones Walk. Graphically rendered in black, white, and golden yellow against the background of the Cyclone’s sweeping arcs, Ackermann’s femme fatales twirl and pose high above the crowds promoting a demonic carnival of darker, hidden attractions.”

ATZ contacted Rita Ackermann via her gallery, but we haven’t yet received a response. If you happen to know the artist, please tell her to get ready to add the word “demolished” to her resume.