The BroadsheetDAILY – 12/10/21 – Pentacle on the Plaza – Abstract Actinoid Enlivens Plaza in World Trade Center Complex

The Broadsheet: Lower Manhattan’s Local Newspaper

Pentacle on the Plaza

Abstract Actinoid Enlivens Plaza in World Trade Center Complex

Quincunx-equential: “Jasper’s Split Star,” an abstract sculpture that has been installed on the plaza in front of Seven World Trade Center.

Lower Manhattan has a new piece of grand public art. In November, Silverstein Properties (the operator of the World Trade Center complex) installed “Jasper’s Split Star,” an abstract piece by legendary artist and sculptor Frank Stella on the plaza in front of Seven World Trade Center (located between West Broadway and Greenwich Street, south of Vesey Street).

The metal-clad starburst sculpture is a reprise, of sorts, to Mr. Stella’s 1962 painting, “Jasper’s Dilemma,” which was meant as a tribute to his friend and fellow artist Jasper Johns. Six of the structure’s sides are solid aluminum, and six remain open to reveal shades of blue, purple, and gray. The star motif refers to Mr. Johns’s paintings of flags, and “Jasper’s Dilemma” contained a spectrum of closely related colors.

A Star Is Born: Artist Frank Stella oversees the installation in November of his sculpture at the Silverstein Family Park.

Mr. Stella, aged 85, explains that, “Jasper Johns often played a grayscale against an obvious chromatic scale of red, orange, yellow, green, and blue. For the most part, it was on a two-dimensional surface. It was hard not to think of transposing that kind of dynamic into three dimensions. So the split star came rather naturally into being as a play of Jasper’s early paintings.”

Mr. Stella’s patron, Larry Silverstein, reflects that, “art has always played a big role in my personal and professional life. It adds an exciting dimension to our lives and everything we do. It expands our thinking and offers a glimpse into the creative minds of the artists.”

The installation of the stelliform sculpture marks a restoration of sorts for the artist. Two of Mr. Stella’s paintings adorned the lobby of Seven World Trade Center, and were destroyed when the original building collapsed in flames on September 11, 2001.

“Jasper’s Split Star” now occupies the space that was formerly home to the Jeff Koons’s “Balloon Flower (Red)”—a magenta, stainless steel piece that resembled the kind of balloon animals created a children’s birthday parties—from 2006 through 2018.

Matthew Fenton

‘One False Promise After Another’

Lenders Who Fronted Millions to Operators of Pier A Allege Fraud

Investors who lent more $16 million to the operators behind the shuttered restaurant at Pier A, on Battery Park City’s southern border allege that the borrowers, “used a fraudulent scheme to squeeze out of the Project all the fees and distributions for themselves that they could before shutting the doors.”

In a development first reported by property industry newsletter the Real Deal, the lenders (Tribeca-based New York City Waterfront Development Fund II) filed suit in Manhattan Supreme Court in November, seeking the return of $16.5 million (the original amount of the 2011 loan, none of which has been repaid), along with $2.63 million in accrued interest, plus attorney’s fees and court costs.

The defendants in this action are a partnership between the Poulakakos restaurant family (who operate numerous Lower Manhattan eateries) and the Dermot Company (a developer of garden apartment complexes around the United States that more recently branched out to New York projects, such as the conversion of Brooklyn’s landmarked Williamsburgh Savings Bank tower into condominium residences). To read more…

Lofty Ambitions

New Law, Sponsored by Glick, Closes Loophole and Protects Tribeca Renters

New York’s roster of tenant protections has grown by one, but this new legal tool is likely to have a disproportionate effect in Lower Manhattan, where many former industrial and commercial buildings have been converted into apartments, known as “lofts.”

For decades, Manhattan districts once populated by warehouses and factories became magnets for artists—who craved open floor plans as studios, and were also drawn by inexpensive rents. These bohemian pioneers made such neighborhoods fashionable for the more affluent (if less talented) homesteaders who followed. To read more…

Trash Talk

New Urban Waste Management Proposal Aims to Duplicate Battery Park City Success

Environmental activists are calling for a waste management pilot program created by the Battery Park City Authority (BPCA) to be rolled out for new buildings throughout New York City.

A centerpiece of the Put Waste to Work campaign, formulated by design studio WXY and the Center for Zero Waste Design (a non-profit that works to develop and implement strategies to reduce the garbage output of urban areas), is to get trash bags from large residential buildings off City streets.

Kicked at the Curb

Study Finds Three Downtown Neighborhoods Generate Millions in City Revenue Through Parking Violations

Lower Manhattan drivers who are chronically aggrieved by the local shortage of legal street parking should consider the bright side: They are contributing millions of dollars per year in revenue to City coffers.

A new analysis by SpotAngels, a smartphone app that aims to soothe parking headaches by offering users real-time data about available street parking options nearby, cites three Downtown neighborhoods as among the worst in the City, as gauged by a pair of metrics.

The first yardstick is the number of parking tickets issued each year (in this case, the 12-month period ending last September), for each 100 legal parking spaces in a given neighborhood. By this standard, Battery Park City tallies second worst in Manhattan (with a ratio of 12.3), while Tribeca and the Financial District are tied for the fourth-worst, each with a ratio of 10.3.

Setting Up House

The Church Street School for Music and Art (41 White Street) is continuing a 25-year tradition by offering Gingerbread Family Workshops on Saturdays and Sundays (11 and 12; and 18 and 19), priced at $85 for early registration or $100 on the day of the event.

To-go kits are also available to assemble at home, complete with a gingerbread house, candy, and freshly made icing. In addition to offering great holiday fun, this program is one of the most important fundraisers for the highly regarded non-profit institution that has brought enrichment to the lives of generations of Lower Manhattan kids.

For more info, please browse: ChurchStreetSchool.org.

CLASSIFIEDS & PERSONALS

Swaps & Trades, Respectable Employment, Lost and Found

To place a listing, contact editor@ebroadsheet.com

EYES TO THE SKY

November 29 – December 12, 2021

“Under One Sky”: human voices from space

I heard the voices of sensitive humans from outer space. They spoke of living in awe of the beauty of a blue planet—Earth—hanging in the blackness of space. The uniqueness of Earth in the cosmos astounded them, charged them with emotion. They observed the Sun white in the great blackness, not as we know the shining orb seen through our blue atmosphere, the sky. Stars—viewed with no atmosphere between eye and star—are vivid, steady lights of different colors: red, orange, yellow, blue, white.

“Nothing could prepare me for the phenomenon of the fragile atmosphere. The thinness of the atmosphere: paper thin.” To read more…

Judy Isacoff

Lower Manhattan Greenmarkets are open

Tribeca Greenmarket

Greenwich Street & Chambers Street

Every Wednesday & Saturday, 8am-3pm

Food Scrap Collection: Saturdays, 8am-1pm

Open Saturdays and Wednesdays year round

Schedule Changes: Market closed 12/25 for Christmas Day and 1/1 for New Year’s Day.

The loyal community of neighborhood residents who shop at the Tribeca Greenmarket show up each Wednesday and Saturday year-round to get their fix of locally grown produce, sustainably raised meat, seafood, sheep’s milk cheese and yogurt, orchard fruit and berries, herbs, live plants and cut flowers. Cooking demonstrations, raffles, and educational activities make the market a hands-on experience for shoppers of all ages.

Farmers:

American Pride Seafood Wild-caught fish and shellfish from Suffolk County, NY

Dipaola Turkeys Turkey and turkey products from Mercer County, NJ

Francesca’s Bakery Breads and baked goods from Passaic County, NJ

Hudson Valley Duck Farm Heritage breed ducks and duck products from Sullivan County, NY

Jersey Farm Produce Vegetables, herbs, orchard and small fruit from Hunterdon County, NJ

Lani’s Farm Vegetables, eggs and prepared foods from Burlington County, NJ

Millport Dairy Eggs, cheddar cheese, beef, pork, pickles and baked goods from Lancaster County, PA

Prospect Hill Orchards Fruit, some certified organic, granola, and baked goods from Ulster County, NY

Tucker Farms Cut Flowers from Burlington & Monmouth County, NJ

Westmeadow Farm cow and goat milk cheeses and cows butter from Montgomery County, NY

Yellow Bell Farm Chicken and eggs from Dutchess County, NY

Bowling Green Greenmarket

Green Greenmarket at Bowling Green

Broadway & Whitehall St

Open Tuesday and Thursdays, year-round

Market Hours: 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

Compost Program: 8 a.m. – 11 a.m.

The Bowling Green Greenmarket brings fresh offerings from local farms to Lower Manhattan’s historic Bowling Green plaza. Twice a week year-round stop by to load up on the season’s freshest fruit, crisp vegetables, beautiful plants, and freshly baked loaves of bread, quiches, and pot pies.

Greenmarket at the Oculus

Oculus Plaza, Fulton St and Church St

CLOSED FOR THE SEASON

The Outdoor Fulton Stall Market

91 South St., bet. Fulton & John Sts.

212-349-1380 info@fultonstallmarket.org

Fulton Street cobblestones between South and Front Sts. across from McNally Jackson Bookstore.

Locally grown produce from Rogowski Farm, Breezy Hill Orchard, and other farmers and small-batch specialty food products, sold directly by their producers. Producers vary from week to week.

INDOOR FARMERS MARKET STORE:

91 South St., bet. Fulton & John Sts. Open Monday – Saturdays 11:30 AM – 5 PM

Indoor Market Hours: Monday – Saturday

11:30 AM to 5:00 PM, year round

SNAP/EBT/P-EBT, Debit/Credit, and Farmers Market Nutrition Program checks accepted at all farmers markets.

TODAY IN HISTORY

DECEMBER 10

1833 -1896 Alfred Nobel, Swedish chemist and engineer, invented Dynamite and founded the Nobel Prize

1520 – Martin Luther burns his copy of the papal bull Exsurge Domine outside Wittenberg’s Elster Gate.

1541 – Thomas Culpeper and Francis Dereham are executed for having affairs with Catherine Howard, Queen of England and wife of Henry VIII.

1684 – Isaac Newton’s derivation of Kepler’s laws from his theory of gravity, contained in the paper De motu corporum in gyrum, is read to the Royal Society by Edmond Halley.

1868 – The first traffic lights are installed, outside the Palace of Westminster in London. Resembling railway signals, they use semaphore arms and are illuminated at night by red and green gas lamps.

1877 – Russo-Turkish War: The Russian Army captures Plevna after a 5-month siege. The garrison of 25,000 surviving Turks surrenders. The Russian victory is decisive for the outcome of the war and the Liberation of Bulgaria.

1884 – Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is published.

1901 – The first Nobel Prize ceremony is held in Stockholm on the fifth anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death.

1902 – The opening of the reservoir of the Aswan Dam in Egypt.

1906 – President Theodore Roosevelt wins the Nobel Peace Prize for his role in the mediation of the Russo-Japanese War, becoming the first American to win a Nobel Prize.

1907 – The worst night of the Brown Dog riots in London, when 1,000 medical students clash with 400 police officers over the existence of a memorial for animals that have been vivisected.

1953 – British Prime Minister Winston Churchill receives the Nobel Prize in literature.

1968 – Japan’s biggest heist, the still-unsolved “300 million yen robbery”, is carried out in Tokyo.

1993 – The last shift leaves Wearmouth Colliery in Sunderland. The closure of the 156-year-old pit marks the end of the old County Durham coalfield, which had been in operation since the Middle Ages.

Births

1452 – Johannes Stöffler, German mathematician and astronomer (d. 1531)

1610 – Adriaen van Ostade, Dutch painter (d. 1685)

1787 – Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, American educator, founded the American School for the Deaf (d. 1851)

1815 – Ada Lovelace, English mathematician and computer scientist (d. 1852)

1830 – Emily Dickinson, American poet (d. 1886)

1908 – Olivier Messiaen, French composer and ornithologist (d. 1992)

1911 – Chet Huntley, American journalist (d. 1974)

1956 – Rod Blagojevich, American lawyer and politician, 40th Governor of Illinois

Deaths

925 – Sancho I, king of Pamplona

949 – Herman I, Duke of Swabia

1113 – Radwan, ruler of Aleppo

1310 – Stephen I, Duke of Bavaria (b. 1271)

1896 – Alfred Nobel, Swedish chemist and engineer, invented Dynamite and founded the Nobel Prize (b. 1833)

1909 – Red Cloud, American tribal chief (b. 1822)

1968 – Thomas Merton, American monk and author (b. 1915)

1990 – Armand Hammer, American businessman, founded Occidental Petroleum (b. 1898)

1993 – Alice Tully, American soprano (b. 1902)

2005 – Eugene McCarthy, American poet, academic, and politician (b. 1916)

2006 – Augusto Pinochet, Chilean general and politician, 30th President of Chile (b. 1915)

Credit: Wikipedia and other internet and non-internet sources

The Broadsheet Inc. eBroadsheet.com editor @ ebroadsheet.com ©2021 All Rights Reserved

No part of this document may be reproduced without the written permission of the publisher © 2021