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Art of the Day: “Greetings from Coney Island” Blends Past & Present

Posted in art, tagged Greetings from Coney Island, Greetings Tour, LunaTics Ice Cream, Marie Roberts, mural, Public Art, Tommy Holiday, Victor Ving on April 20, 2015| 1 Comment »

Greetings from Coney Island mural on LunaTics Ice Cream building, Surf Avenue near Stillwell. April 18, 2015. Photo © Tricia Vita

The eye-popping “Greetings from Coney Island” mural on the side of LunaTics Ice Cream building that we wrote about last week as a work-in-progress is finished and already a magnet for tourists and cellphone cameras. Coney Island sign painter Tommy Holiday and former graffiti artist Victor Ving speedily completed the work in just a few days. On Saturday we stopped by to catch the artists’ signing ceremony.

Greetings from Coney Island muralists Tommy Holiday and Victor Ving in front of the “N” and the “E,” featuring the Steeplechase Funny Face and Wonder Wheel Park’s Spook-A-Rama Cyclops. April 18, 2015. Photo © Tricia Vita

Tommy’s Coney creds include painting the cars on the Cyclone roller coaster and signage for Coney Island USA and Wonder Wheel Park. Later this month, Victor and photographer Lisa Beggs are embarking on a year-long “Greetings Tour” of the U.S. to paint vintage postcard inspired murals. You can follow them at @GreetingsTour on twitter and Instagram. Besides the work in Coney Island, “Greetings from…” murals have already been painted in Chinatown, Red Hook in Brooklyn, Jersey City, and Canton, Ohio, in collaboration with local artists.

The letter “N” in Tommy Holiday and Victor Ving’s mural features the Cyclone roller coaster. April 18, 2015. Photo © Tricia Vita

“When I got the wall, I didn’t know what I was going to do, ” Tommy told ATZ. “I wanted it to be historical as well as current.” Each letter of the mural puts a Coney landmark or luminary in the spotlight and is a work of art unto itself. Our favorite is the “E,” an intricate mingling of the Wonder Wheel’s neon sign and the Cyclops from Spook-A-Rama. The Cyclone’s “N” and Luna Park’s “Y” offer a hat tip to the vanished Astroland. The “S” is the landmark Childs Restaurant building on the Boardwalk, which is currently under renovation. The design is a throwback to the days when it was vacant and tagged by graffiti artists and features the tags of old friends.

The letter “S” in Tommy Holiday and Victor Ving’s mural features the landmark Childs building on the Boardwalk. April 18, 2015. Photo © Tricia Vita

Other letters showcase the Boardwalk, Steeplechase Funny Face, Eldorado Bumper Cars, Parachute Jump, Nathan’s, and the wall’s owners, LunaTic Ice Cream. The artists also paid homage to a Coney Island artist whose public art has endured: Marie Roberts’ sideshow banners adorn Coney Island USA’s landmark building and one of them is the “D” in Coney Island.

Victor Ving signing a corner of the mural, His @GreetingsTour starts on April 28. Photo © Tricia Vita

Let’s hope the mural inspires more property owners to donate wall space. The years since the Coney Island rezoning have not been kind to public art. When the Dreamland Artists Club’s murals and signage debuted in June 2004, Steve Powers told the Times: “A large percentage of them will be up forever.” More than a decade later, only a handful remain including Powers’ “Bump Your Ass Off” signs for the Eldorado and his staircase mural for the Coney Island Museum. Daze’s fish on West 12th Street and Os Gemeos’ mural on Stillwell are badly peeling.

Tommy Holiday signing a corner of the mural. April 18, 2015. Photo © Tricia Vita

If you want to party with the new “Greetings from Coney Island” mural, the chain-link fenced lot adjacent to it is the former Shore Hotel site owned by Thor Equities and is for lease for $25,000 for the season.

The mural is on the side of LunaTics Ice Cream building at 1224 Surf Ave in Coney Island.

Work-in-Progress: Tommy Holiday’s Coney Island Mural on Surf Avenue

Posted in art, tagged LunaTics Ice Cream, mural, sign painter, Surf Avenue, Tommy Holiday on April 15, 2015| Leave a Comment »

Work-in-progress: Tommy Holiday mural on side of LunaTics Ice Cream, Coney Island. April 15, 2015. Photo by Stan Fox

“A friend and I will be painting a huge Coney Island mural on the side of LunaTics Ice Cream shop on Surf Avenue,” wrote Coney sign painter Tommy Holiday in an email to ATZ. His previous work in Coney Island includes Coney Island USA, Wonder Wheel Park, and the cars of the Cyclone. Today, they are filling in the letters with designs featuring Steeplechase’s Funny Face, the Wonder Wheel, Luna Park’s gate and more. Many thanks to Stan Fox for his photos of the work-in-progress.

Work-in-progress: mural on side of LunaTics Ice Cream, Coney Island. April 15, 2015. Photo by Stan Fox

NY Aquarium’s Coney Island Mural Partially Removed From Wall

Posted in art, Photography, tagged Boardwalk, Coney Island, construction, mural, New York Aquarium on May 1, 2014| 3 Comments »

Back in March, the New York Aquarium’s popular mural on the Coney Island Boardwalk at West 8th Street was partially taken down due to the poor condition of the wall. Two-thirds of the approximately 211-foot-long mural was removed. We were waiting to see what would happen at the site before writing about it, but no work has been observed since then.

The frequently photographed mural depicts such Coney Island landmarks as the Parachute Jump, Cyclone and Wonder Wheel along with tidbits of historical info and quotes such as George C Tilyou’s famous line “If Paris is France, then Coney Island, between June and September, is the world.” Details that were removed include Dreamland’s Iron Tower, a capsule from Astroland’s Skyride, and scenes of undersea life. The artwork was painted in 2006.

New York Aquarium: Reconstruction of Crumbling Wall Aquarium Required Removal of Mural

Several readers have emailed to ask if the mural will be repainted after repairs to the wall. “The mural is being taken down for safety reasons,” WCS spokesperson Barbara Russo replied to a query from ATZ. “I’ll give you more updates as I have them.” Word from the Aquarium staff is no decision has yet been made.

According to the Mural Locator website, the seaside mural was a pro bono project taken on by artist Thanh X Tran and VSA Partners.

Working on a very tight deadline, a four-person team completed the illustration using Adobe Illustrator and stock photos as tracing references. In partnership with Colossal Media—one of the last sign painting companies in New York—we transferred the complicated design onto the wall’s surface. Over one hundred volunteers painted the mural (approximately 15 x 211 feet) in the span of a week, to the delight of Coney Island’s locals.