Wooster Collective is a blog site that focuses on ephemeral art found on the streets of cities. The group went online in 2003 to give recognition to street art in their neighborhood. Hence their name Wooster Collective, Wooster being a street in Soho NYC and collection linking with a collective decision.

The grid like posts remind me of the tumblr style of posting, except without the options to like, reblog, and comment. The site may look cluttered but it seems pretty easy to navigate. Just click on the post you want to see and a new page will open, or if you’re looking for something specific there is the search box on the right side of the blog. Even if the grid view, which is sort of ordered like tumblr, is not appealing to some viewers there is always the list view that viewers can switch to. Plus there is no advertisements on the main page. There are some glitches with the grid view, especially with the video screens overlapping with the text on the right side of the page. However the grid like view makes the site seem more like a colorful collage, giving an impression of the site being a work of art. Yet the blog feels like an incomplete collage, it is as though there isn’t any thought to the way the photos or videos were arranged.

The focus of the site is pretty straight forward, it is about art pieces that stand out in cities. While the blog may seem to cover mostly street art, there are posts about sculptures and videos about artists or their works. The most interesting posts are under “Shit We’re Diggin'”. For instance there is Zonekinder’s Tree Characters in Ukraine. And my  personal favorite piece, Blake Shaw video painting refugee portraits in Israel.

Photo: INTI in Istanbul, Turkey

The writing style of the blog is very straight forward. In fact the author does not share his or her voice at all, which is very disappointing. The writing style takes a much more professional approach, introducing basic information about the sculpture or specific event. The author does not blab about unrelated topics like his or her dying goldfish, which is fortunate. Although it would be nice to have the author share his or her opinion on the work.

There were some spellings and grammatical errors I found, only in one post. Yet it was not because the author did not know the English language well but because the post was probably done last minute. Which made me wonder why did he or she not have anyone proof read or edit it. For example, at the end of a certain film post the word people was misspelled and the period to conclude the sentence was forgotten.

The blog is not intended for professional art critics, since there is no mention of critical reviews or praise on artwork. Wooster Collective is more for audiences that are new to the art world and have a general interest in art. There are various kinds of art work covered in the blog; such as video paintings, murals, graffiti, sculptures, animations, and film. Although all of these art works have a central focus of being ephemeral.

Photo: Zonekinder’s Tree Characters in Ukraine

In the end, Wooster Collective is a great blog site for beginners interested in street art. The grid layout of the blog makes it look like a collage. The content and photography of the blog is appealing, although the blog could work on the writing and add a comment section to it.