I’m a New Yorker; I swear to it, it’s true. But I’m still unfamiliar with most parts of the city. Before this class, whenever I took trips to the city, my friends and always ended up visiting the same places – Times Square, Central Park, Harold Square… I mean they had all we needed anyway: good food/green space/karaoke bars. But it wasn’t that I never ventured anywhere else. I’d been to Greenwich Village a few times, OK one time before the project. At the time though, I hadn’t realized the area was called Greenwich Village, I had assumed that the rest of the population of New York had given the region the same name I had “that area around NYU.”

I managed to meet up with the rest of my group at Washington Square Park, after a couple of city slickers pointed me in the wrong direction. The arch looked amazing all lit up at night. “There,” I thought. “That’s art.” Then went to a coffee shop, where we sat and ate along a window, staring blatantly at the passersby. I was convinced some artsy-looking fellow would walk in and sit down. One actually did. This fellow mentioned an artist in the area that sits on stoops and paints the community around him. What else did he consider art? “The old buildings and all that, that’s art.”

We walked back to Washington Park where we came across an NYU theater group dressed in mid 20^th century clothing chanting about the evils of Prohibition and the like. They were obviously too preoccupied to interview but I’m sure if had interviewed them they would’ve told us that their performances are prime examples of art in the Village.

We then did the unthinkable: an infiltration of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. I walked into the building, right up to the security guard and on the spot made up some mumbo-jumbo about an arts seminar that had to be worked on. Too easy.

Walking through the gallery, I saw mostly photographs, and nothing really stood out to me. While we were in the Tisch school we stopped a student and asked him where we could find some artwork in the Village. “You won’t find any around here,” he said. “Unless you’re in this building.” He sounded kind of uninformed for a student studying art in the area but I was still very grateful for his opinion.

And I didn’t think of it until now, but people of Greenwich Village are particularly fashion-forward, even for New Yorkers. The residents’ individuality is showcased through their clothing. Scarves, boots, and brightly colored tights; standout accessories strategically placed here and there. Their clothing creates an expression, sometimes even a message. And it can be deemed as art because that’s what art is, creatively putting something together to display a message, even if that message is as simple as “I like stockings with patterns on them.”

Before I describe the art my group and I discovered in Little Italy, I would like to address some issues that plague Little Italy today.

As a fellow Italian, or at least half of one, I have always wanted to visit Little Italy to get a taste of the culture that has prevailed in my family for centuries. Whenever I heard the name Little Italy, I imagined a town filled to the brim with Italian culture and hundreds of Italians that lived in a tightly knit community where everyone referred to each other as “paesano.” If I went to Little Italy decades ago I would have seen the town I had always dreamed about, but unfortunately that is not the case today.

Presently, Little Italy is a miniscule neighborhood that consists of mostly restaurants, one museum the size of a small bank (literally), a couple vintage clothing stores, and a few apartment complexes. All of the people that made Little Italy so great have moved on and took the Italian culture with them. The museum guide even said it herself, “Little Italy has become more of a tourist attraction rather than a town that reflects Italian culture.”

If that’s not bad enough, Little Italy continues to shrink due to the overwhelming size of Chinatown that continues to grow everyday. When an owner decides to sell their business, the shop is engulfed by Chinatown instantly. I was astonished to see how I went from Italy to China as I turned the corner. Given the circumstances, Little Italy will probably cease to exist in the near future. As John Delucra said, “It’s only fair. We took this town from the Irish, and now the Chinese are going to take it from us.”

Now I will go on to describe the art. I have to admit Little Italy is not the place to go to find eccentric architecture, paintings, or anything else you would find in a museum, unless you go to the Italian American Museum of course. As Ashley stated in her blog, Little Italy is home to the most exquisite Italian cuisine I have ever seen. The culinary arts of Little Italy are definitely something to marvel at.

There may not be Italian art, but at least there are photo shoots for fashion campaigns

At the Café Palermo, owned by John Delucra, I tasted the most delicious cannoli I have ever eaten. Each and every cannoli is hand-made using a family recipe that was passed down over generations. The sweet cream with a hint of lemon, the chocolaty chocolate chips, the crisp outer shell, and the mouthwatering powdered sugar that makes you want to lick the plate clean put together creates this masterpiece we call the best Cannoli in New York City, and maybe the world. Currently, John Delucra is working on the $1,000 cannoli competition, which requires one to make the most expensive, and edible, cannoli on the market. (More details can be found in the video interview on a previous post)

I ate my cannoli to quickly to take a picture, but they look as good as they taste

In addition to a delicious cannoli, one can visit the restaurant that served the first pizza in America over 100 years ago. Angelo’s, coincidentally the restaurant right next to Café Palermo, was established in 1902 and still exists to this day. Making a pizza is a work of art, which places the first people to do it in America as innovators of the arts. Angelo himself made the first authentic New York pizza every New Yorker has come to love today. So if you ever get a chance, I highly recommend that you go to Little Italy to have a taste of the best cannoli and pizza New York has to offer.

Home of the first pizza in America

Every time we asked, “Where can we find art in Little Italy?” everyone pointed us to the food. Food is all the talk in a neighborhood that is overrun by restaurants. Walking down the streets, we couldn’t avoid being stopped by every restaurant owner trying to pull us into their restaurant for lunch. It is a very competitive business, but each restaurant has something special to offer. I find it amazing how every restaurant serves exactly the same menu, and yet could still be so distinct from one another. There is always one dish that makes a restaurant stand out whether it’s a cannoli, a pizza, baked clams, or any other classic Italian dish.

Little Italy is a place to find some of the best Italian food in New York and that’s about it. There is a little bit of history that could be found, but you have to search really hard to discover it. Personally, if it weren’t for the interviews I wouldn’t have learned a thing by simply exploring Little Italy for myself except for the fact that John Delucra makes a mean cannoli. Still I highly suggest that New Yorkers pay a visit to Little Italy in the future, because sadly it may not be around much longer.

P.S. The video interviews for our trip to Italy can be found in a previous post.

A dog better not pee on Italy's pride!

YUMMMMM

The vintage clothing shops had interesting antiques

Little Italy turned out to be an adventure once we actually found it. Tyler, Ashley, Alyssa, and I witnessed a completely different mood as we moved into serene Mulberry Street from the loud hustle and bustle of Chinatown businesses. We weren’t yet sure where we actually were until we saw a little cart that said CANOLI SHACK. A quick look down the street and many Italian restaurant banners came into view. When I say many I mean A LOT of restaurants. There were so many at least 3 or 4 per block that it was impossible to decide where to eat. I wondered how anyone visiting this neighborhood would figure out where they were going to eat lunch. There were just too many restaurants to choose from. Adding to the pressure were the representatives of each restaurant standing outside and competing for lunch patrons by advertising the exact same food. “Lunch guys? Lunch ladies? We have the best pasta in town!”

We made our way down the block and were searching for Little Italy’s art. Out of nowhere comes the greatest sign for the Italian American Museum. Ding Ding Ding there must be art in there! We encountered a small museum that was only maybe double the size of our classroom. The young woman working there was extremely nice and even allowed us to interview her as she walked us through the different art pieces of the museum. Check out the videos of all of interviews in our Interviews in Little Italy post below! The coolest thing about the museum was that it was once a bank from 1885- 1932 when Little Italy was a thriving Italian American community. I thought that the old cash register and the old safe were the most interesting pieces because it showed the history of the neighborhood in something as simple as an old bank. The safe was especially awesome because it had been left shut in the bank only to be opened by a professional safecracker many years later when the bank was to be turned into the museum that it was now. The safe contained envelopes and notes that were not claimed and are left on display at the museum. I admired the fact that they were able to preserve this remnant of the original neighborhood as it once was.

Along our merry way we came across this vintage clothing shop that had old clothes from as early as the 1850s. The woman in the store had a really indifferent view towards the neighborhood especially the restaurants because she mentioned that they all served the same exact food. I think this was a good contrast to the interviews we were having that mostly described positive aspects of the neighborhood. The store clerk worked in the neighborhood daily and we could tell she wasn’t too crazy about it.

We began a journey to Sal’s pizza shop and I thought Sal’s pizza…? Where have I heard that before? I know!! Do the Right Thing!! It was almost a real depiction of the restaurant it was so strange it even had its own wall of fame! We had some good fairly cheap pizza and I caught a picture of real life Sal. I wanted to tell him about the movie but then I was reminded that it never ended well for the restaurant.

After pizza we were still hungry and still needed one more interview. We decided to go to Caffé Palermo that boasted “Best Cannoli on the planet Earth.” We all had some delicious dessert. While eating we noticed all these cut out boards of this Italian guy who looked like he might be the owner. Then we turn around and at one of the tables the same guy was there! Ashley went up to him and asked if we could do a video interview and it turned out to be the best interview of the day. His name was John Delutro and he owned the café since he was seventeen years old and has been running it for the past 39 years. I was blown by the fact that he was able to keep this café of his open for so long and busy with customers. He was a sweet guy and really wanted to explain his story to us. He told us how he was born and raised in the neighborhood, how the neighborhood came to be, and how it is declining as a neighborhood for Italian American residents. I was surprised he was one of the few to still live in the neighborhood as he said most people were able to sell there houses for much higher prices than they paid for it and then moved to Brooklyn or Queens. He told us about the open neighborhood he once lived in where no one locked their doors, he could sleep on the fire escape, and the neighborhood was one large cohesive unit. I found this interview to be the best way to end our day as it really stood out because we actually got a first hand account from someone who is a true native of the neighborhood. He was able to relate the story of Little Italy through his eyes and I could tell the connection he had with his neighborhood was very special to him.

Explore Chinatown while looking for works of art? Easy!! I’m in this neighborhood practically every week. I know my way around. This assignment should take no longer than an hour or two. It wasn’t until half an hour into our visit to Chinatown that I realized how wrong I was. There were so many significant places in this neighborhood that I had never encountered!

Rui Yan, Vishal, Rawan and I braved the freezing autumn winds and walked all around Chinatown last Sunday. We were looking for something that would be considered art. Luckily for us, a certain part of Chinatown, called Confucius Plaza, has two statues of famous Chinese philosophers. One of them was of course, Confucius. Confucius emphasized morality, justice and sincerity. This statue is considered as art because it represents the cultural values that the Chinese live by.

After we had found our “piece of art”, we decided to search for people we could interview. Fortunately, there was a small group of people from Brooklyn standing right by the statue of Confucius. They just so happened to be waiting for someone and had some free time on their hands. We interviewed them for a few minutes and they kindly gave us their insight on art in Chinatown. They weren’t too familiar with the neighborhood, but they did suggest Columbus Park, where senior citizens like to practice their tai chi, have chess tournaments and play music. We came across a very nice old man, who was willing to sit down with us for about ten minutes. He told us all about his life in China and introduced us to a few of the instruments that he and his buddies liked to play in the park. (He told us the names of the instruments in Chinese, so I have no idea what they’re called in English.) During the interview, I looked around and saw that there were many senior citizens hanging out in the park. Most of them seemed to be very close with each other, laughing and sharing stories. It really gave off a friendly vibe. Columbus Park definitely adds significance to Chinatown.

Rui Yan had introduced us to a certain theater that hosted shows such as operas. I can’t believe I’ve never even heard of this place! We had wanted to interview one of the performers, so we decided to sit in on one of the shows and wait for it to end so we could go backstage. Did I mention that the show was free?? The auditorium was practically filled. Although I did not enjoy the opera much, (It was rather boring for me. I didn’t understand a word they were singing, and the performers didn’t really seem to connect with the audience.) I was able to experience a taste of the music of my culture.

Chinatown is a very crowded and dirty place. But it also has a variety cultural entertainment. From little Chinese gift shops to delectable dim sum restaurants, Chinatown really is an exciting neighborhood to be in. I’m glad I got to learn so many new things about my culture from this assignment. I grew a new respect for Chinatown. I finally understand why tourists from all over the world are willing to spend their vacation in a crowded place like this. Although Chinatown isn’t the best neighborhood to enjoy art, one visit could teach people a great deal about the Chinese culture.

Oh how I love Greenwich Village.  It looks like Diagon Alley, it has the greatest mushroom ravioli ever, and most importantly for this blog, it’s known for its beautiful architecture.  As Eric and Kayde mentioned, we decided it would be fun to meet up on Friday night by Washington Square Park’s famous arch, which is the most prominent work of art in the entire Village.  The arch, a monument built to honor the 100^th anniversary of the inauguration of our first president, was clearly inspired by the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.  I’ve had the pleasure of seeing both in my life, and the one major difference is that Napoleon insisted that the names of all the places he conquered were carved into the sides of his arch, whereas G-Dubs was both a more humble man and quite dead by the time his arch was built.  Nevertheless, it’s an incredibly beautiful piece of architecture and it makes me really happy that New York has its own little slice of Paris right in the Village. (Ever since I went in April, I’m kind of obsessed with Paris. Does somebody want to be like Helen in Bridesmaids and take me back?)

  vs 

One of the things that struck me about Greenwich Village is that even though it has a reputation as an artsy neighborhood, there is actually very little traditional art there!  When we infiltrated NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, one of the students actually told us that when he thinks of art in the area, he thinks of Chelsea.  As he put it, most of the art galleries have moved out of the Village to Chelsea because the rent in the Village is 2 DAMN HIGH.  (Sorry, I couldn’t resist…is that guy even still relevant anymore?)  But even though it doesn’t really have any galleries, the Village still does earn its reputation as an artsy neighborhood because of the architecture of its beautiful buildings, many of which are owned by NYU.  I thought their student union was particularly pretty—you can see it in the background behind the fountain.

However, it’s not just the architecture that makes the Village artsy.  To get out of the cold for a few minutes we went into one of the local university cafés, and a young man we interviewed there mentioned that every morning on one of the nearby streets a man with curly hair just sits and paints all day (see Eric’s blog for the video).  When we came back into the park we ran into NYU’s theater group rehearsing in full early 20^th century attire for a play about the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory.  Also, earlier in the evening when I was walking around the Village with my dad, we spotted two street performers playing a violin duet.  So you see, a lot of the art we found was not the type of art that usually comes to mind!  But maybe that was the reason why I enjoyed myself so much in Greenwich Village—rather than the art being contained in a gallery, the fact that it was literally built into the neighborhood via the architecture really makes the Village feel like a living, breathing piece of art.  (Although, like Kayde said—good luck finding anything there, unless you happen to be looking for a giant, white, illuminated arch)

            Our night started in Union Square Park and immediately we saw this statue of Ghandi. Not only did he have a necklace made of flowers, but in front of him was an entire garden. The beautiful plants in bright colors were a great start to my night and really got me in a nature mood.

            Although at times it was questionable which neighborhood we were actually in, we were all too distracted by the apartments to really care. There were gorgeous townhouses and walkups all decorated lavishly with beautiful wrought iron doors. I admit I proclaimed “I NEED TO LIVE HERE” a few too many times. When Zohar went to check her lottery ticket, I let her know that if she won, she was absolutely obligated to buy me a townhouse.

What was really interesting to me was the opportunity Halloween presented for the average person to be an artist. Almost every building had some form of Jack-O-Lanterns in front of it, and we found some pretty unique ones. I think that the pumpkins were an outlet of creativity that most people usually don’t get. For just a little while, every one of all ages and backgrounds get to unleash their wild spirit into a pumpkin face.

After finding many different Jack-O-Lanterns, we actually passed an apartment building that had a whole pumpkin on display in their courtyard. Walking down a main street with shops, we found a florist who had incorporated pumpkins into their windows. I think it’s safe to say that pumpkins are a pretty vital part of natural art this time of year.

Of course, this is not the type of art most people expect to hear about. Through walking, and in our interviews, we got to hear about various other types of art. We passed many cool galleries that were unfortunately closed. These ranged from regular art exhibits to “drawing workshops.” In an interview with a security guard, he even told us that the New School often exhibits student artwork. Two girls sitting in a Starbucks let us know about a Lower East Side walking tour, which we unfortunately could not take because it was night. (GAAAAHHH!)  In my favorite interview, someone who works at Blue Man Group told us about street art and street performers. I would have loved to see these! Graffiti is awesome because people can really do whatever they want. They have no pressure to make their art in a certain way or to please a certain group of people. Street performers are extremely cool because it’s pretty much live theater for free. They perform for everyone, so people on their way to work, people shopping, people just walking around all get a little art in their life. This can be in the form of music, a live statue, or even a “human robot.” I think as much as people don’t like being asked for money, street performers make everyone smile a little bit…

Proof that the entire ZENS group was together.

One of my biggest issues with the Village the few times that I’ve ventured to the area was that it is impossible to maneuver. The streets all seem to converge and unless you’ve committed the street names to memory, even the best sense of direction will need assistance. Even when we went to see Asuncion, we shared adventures of getting lost and/or followed, and if I recall, Professor Healey mentioned that even the people who live in the Village don’t know their way around.

Despite my quarrels with the layout of the village, I was excited to be assigned this neighborhood, because quite frankly, I’m never there. That being said, my group decided that our meeting place would be Washington Square Park, an area often depicted as an artistic experience in and of itself. However, as I arrived to the park, I couldn’t help but feel off put by the construction that was going on and the grass all being fenced off. How would one attend an artistic performance in a park that is partially a construction site. Nonetheless, individuals flocked to the park on that chilly Friday night. The main attraction? The beautiful illuminated arch in the middle of the park.

I think it need not be explained why my group unanimously decided that the arch would be the focus (and meet up destination) of our conquest to find art in the Village. Heck, if architects didn’t know it would be such a huge attraction, they wouldn’t have invested God knows how much money to have the structure illuminated for the late night dwellers who happen to wander into the park. Which is another thing that I found interesting, unlike other parks, the sign for this park said it closes at 12am in comparison to 9pm. I guess that worked out well for the NYU theater students that we happened to come across rehearsing their play on worker’s rights in the middle of the park. Dressed for the part, they marched around in the 20th century attire and demanded less hours and more pay.

Not only does the park attract theater performers, but we also came across many photographers trying to capture the beauty of the arch. In fact, one of the photographers informed us that he even though he wasn’t from the area, he was in the park to photograph an event that was happening for Nike. This demonstrated not only the diverse forms of art and expression that occur in this iconic part of the Village, but the appeal of the park to non-locals.

As my group ventured out of the park and into the rest of the city, the presence of NYU seemed to be a very influential aspect of the neighborhood. The architecture of the dorms and many of the buildings had a very quaint appeal to them, and felt like they should belong in a vintage movie about a struggling artist. Continuing our quest to find art, we were, much to our surprise, permitted to enter the Tisch School of the Arts, where a lecture seemed to be held in a room just out of our reach. We did however, get to interview one student who had a very interesting take on art in the Village. When we asked him how he felt about the area, he declared that there isn’t much art left to be found outside of the school’s gallery.

He supported his claim by explaining how much of the local artists had been pushed out of the area by it’s increasing cost of living there, and all that remains is wealthy, privileged NYU students. To an extent, I agree with this student, although I find it ironic that he insult the “rich NYU kid” being that he most likely is one of them. While my group walked around the Village, it seemed more filled with pretentious college students, bustling about, and quite possibly looking for a party (hey, it was a Friday night after all). Although we did encounter various art forms in the park, and were informed of a local “curly haired” artist, I did not see much evidence of art outside of the school of art and Washington Square Park. I think the area does show remnants of a once predominantly artistic community, especially with it’s beautiful brownstones. However, other than that, I did not see any sculptures, murals, not even any graffiti. Maybe the lack of activity was due to the chilly weather, but I must agree with the student from the gallery and say that majority of art has been removed from the Village, and in its place are pretentious individuals longing to appear artistic (who must have AMAZING GPS systems on their phones).

After reading the assignment, Zohar, Ebrahim, Nicki and Sylvia (ZENS), were excited to get started…so excited we made a catchy/witty group name ^_^! Like my groupmates I was quite skeptical on whether or not we’d find any art in Lower East Side. I know the infamous Museum Mile but that’s Upper East Side! So after some research I was anxious to go on this quest and find a mime to guarantee my A+.  Alas, Lower East Side had no mimes. 🙁

Galleries. I think Lower East Side is infamous for these because as we were walking block after block we saw so many various galleries. Upon discovering these galleries I was ecstatic, thinking this assignment will be cake…unfortunately, they were all closed -_-. What was even more grrr inducing (frustrating in Ebrahim) is that all the security guards were camera shy and didn’t give us any worthwhile info.

Architecture. What I will say about Lower East Side is it has a lot of beautiful architecture. As we were walking around I saw unconventional (in the most awesome way) buildings and really awesome doorways. See Sylvia’s awesome blog post about the architectural magic in the Lower East Side

During our interviews I began to ask myself, what exactly constitutes as art? After all, I’m asking these total strangers where they’d go to find art and I don’t even know what I fully consider as art! Or do I? (dun dun dunnnn! *dramaticmusic*)

The best part of the quest was definitely going down to the Blue Man Group and talking to this fun-loving awesome dude. He told us that his favorite type of art in the Lower East Side is in fact the street art and performers you can find. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to see any street performers. However, I agree with him; if I was traveling to any community in the search for art, even though I’d definitely pop in some museums and galleries, my favorite type of art would be street art.

Holidays however, also allow individuals to express themselves in an artistic manner with wondrous decorations and Lower East Side was living proof of this (well technically Lower East Side can’t breathe nor would it be considered ‘living’ but you get what I mean). Halloween is of course notorious for its use of pumpkins and jack-o-lanterns. As we walked down blocks of homes we couldn’t help going crazy, crossing the street back and forth to take pictures of these creative pumpkins. Now you may think that cutting a pumpkin isn’t an art form but just look at these pictures!

PS. Keep an eye out for ZENS production of Inhabited, coming to Queens College this December.

… you accidentally enter the wrong bathroom. While in Chinatown, before my group and I were getting ready to watch a free performance, I needed to use the restroom and remember being confused about which bathroom to enter since both of the doors were wide open and you couldn’t see the front side of either door. I just randomly chose the door on the right and went in and saw nobody. When I come out, I see my group laughing hysterically and think, “What’s so funny?” Then I realize that a guy just came out of the bathroom on the other side – OOPS!! It’s not my fault I can’t read the Chinese words which were on top of the bathrooms which I saw afterwards.

Anyways, aside from this little anecdote, going to Chinatown in downtown Manhattan was in some ways familiar to me while in others, very different. When I think of Chinatown, what comes to mind first would have to be all the very cheap food restaurants and the street vendors. All this, I most definitely saw when I went to Chinatown but I also an artwork, a statue of Confucius which we decided to make our piece of artwork to focus on in Chinatown. We decided to make the statue of Confucius the piece of art we were going to focus on because Confucius is such a central figure in the lives of Chinese people because of all the principles he has set for Chinese people to follow. The statue of Confucius is art because it represents the cultural and moral values of a whole nation.

On our vast expeditions of Chinatown, Rui Yan happened to show us a place where we could enjoy live Chinese performance for free. Unfortunately, when we got to the performance, I didn’t really enjoy it at all. Even though I thought that the costumes for the performance were decent (I keep reminding myself that I need to get a pink suit), I just found the performance to be really boring. All I saw were two emotionless people on stage, who were just singing and nothing else. They didn’t seem engaged with the audience and I couldn’t understand a word they were saying because it was all in Chinese – maybe that’s why they call it “Chinatown”. Before the performance, when Rui Yan and Jodi asked to interview the director of the play, we were sadly turned down because she was busy preparing all the singers. Although we did not get to interview the director, we still did manage to fit in three interviews.

We saw two people just waiting on the corner of the street waiting for somebody so we went up to them and asked them for an interview. Like us, they were also relatively new to Chinatown and they didn’t seem to know too much about it but they did give us some information about the Confucius statue and Columbus Park. After hearing more about Columbus Park, it quickly became our next destination. From a couple blocks away from Columbus Park, we could already hear the wonderful tradition music being played. Without a doubt, Columbus Park is the most eventful place in Chinatown. Within, you would find many older Chinese people just sitting around and playing music which is where we found our next victim. Although our next interviewee was speaking in Chinese, I could tell that he was really knowledgeable about Chinatown and he has been there for a long time. He gave us some insight into his daily life, saying that Chinatown is his life and on a daily basis, he comes to Columbus Park with his little music group, playing their traditional Chinese instruments. After all this, we were all craving (especially me) for some dim-sum which I have always wanted to try so we went to a restaurant that Jodi had suggested. We luckily found a table right away, in which we found our next victims. When asked about the artwork in Chinatown, they were timid in their answers but when asked why do they even come to Chinatown, they had a more direct answer. They were primarily here for grocery shopping and for the very cheap food which I have to say was delicious.

All in all, Chinatown, is not really a place filled with tourist attractions and artwork, but a place filled with street vendors and restaurants. While looking at the statue of Confucius, I realized that we were really the only ones looking at the statue which made me believe that people don’t really come here for the art. In the end, I did come out with a enjoyable experience. I got the chance to listen to traditional Chinese music at Columbus Park, eat dim-sum for the first time in my life, and watch a live Chinese performance. Out of all this, there is most definitely one thing that I will remember the next time I go to Chinatown, always make sure to look above the bathroom and to read all the signs, whether it be in Chinese or English. Hopefully next time I won’t make the same mistake.

Little Italy isn’t exactly what it used to be. When walking down the streets, no one will find age old Italian families sitting on their stoops or playing in the street, one will actually be hardpressed to find some Italian families. While Little Italy used to consist of Italian-American residents actually living in the area, it has now been consumed almost entirely by Chinatown, which borders it. As a matter of fact, when walking out of the subway station (which should have thrown us immediately into Little Italy) I found myself staring at an awning with a gigantic dragon and the words Little Chinatown. Now instead of being some ethnic neighborhood, Little Italy is essentially just a strip of Italian restaurants lining the streets of Manhattan. You can’t walk two feet without a man stepping in front of you inviting you inside for his lunch special. This is not to say, of course, that it is lacking any artistic value. It just consists of it’s own unique art. The art there is different, but still inspires emotion. When I listen to Luciano Pavarotti belt out Vesti La Giubba, I am brought to tears. When I gaze upon the Mona Lisa, I am struck with awe. But none of these feelings amount to the swell of emotions I felt when I brought the first bite of Palermo’s brownie cheesecake to my mouth. I mean, don’t you want to just die looking at it?

The rich ricotta flavor, the smooth creamy texture, the dense chocolate brownie, all carefullly constructed and beautifully placed on my dish. John Delucra (owner and founder of Café Palermo) imports all of his cakes in from Italy daily (that’s right-straight from Italy!) and to me, this slice was the truest piece of art.

When we asked around, a lot of people found themselves at a loss as to where we can find any particular piece of art, but to me, there was art on every corner. Cuisine is just as artistic as any other venue, and it was all round us.

To create a piece of cheesecake such as the one I consumed, it takes skill, craftsmanship, and extreme culinary talent. The eggs must be beaten in a delicate manner, the sugar blended with the butter just right. Every step takes careful thought and intense deliberation. One artist may wield his paintbrush, another grips in his hand his wooden spoon.

In this manner, Little Italy is riddled with the arts.

Giovanni’s, Angelo’s, Sal’s,  La Nonna, Cafe Palermo; these are just a few of the restaurants that one encounters. Each one brings something different to the table, each place has a different piece that is it’s distinct artwork, and each one as good as a museum as far as exhibiting art goes. Whether they have the best cannoli, the best marinara sauce, the best clams (for a directory of which restaurant to go to for each of these, please consult our video), each one has its claim to fame, i.e; the dish that they create with the utmost artistic abilities.

While Little Italy isn’t too immersed in any street art or performances, it is still the best source of Italian cuisine. If you approach a random passerby on the street and say “Where’s the best place to get lunch around here?” they will hesitate, fumble for words for a second, then each one will have a different answer. And everyone will be right.

So if you want a place to view gorgeous pictures, listen to amazing sonatas and watch mesmerizing shows, Little Italy may not be the place to go. But if you want to tantalize your tastebuds, and stimulate your mind through a blend of ingredients, it is the place to go. Maybe I’ll see you there, I know for one that I will be going back for that cheesecake pretty soon…