Examples of street art in SoHo and New York City, including Francoise Schein’s “Subway Map Floating on a NY Sidewalk” on Greene Street and Ken Rock’s sidewalk art at the corner of Broadway and Prince.

The 1970’s were the heyday of New York graffiti. I remember sitting in subway cars so thoroughly covered, inside and out, with spray-painted tags and images that I could hardly see out the windows. I also remember a starker form of graffiti that, although not limited to SoHo’s boundaries, most certainly originated in the downtown scene that grew out of SoHo. 

My memories of SoHo in the 70's are not shot in digital video, or even 35 mm, but rather in shaky super-8.  But as my reminiscences of childhood advance into adolescence, at some point, my memories of SoHo loose their drab, almost monochrome quality and take on the vibrant colors of the land of Oz.