Esther Zuckerman

​We knew we were in the right place Thursday night when we spotted the crocheted shopping cart hanging above the storefronts on Orchard Street: yarn-wizard and Runnin' Scared favorite Olek's newest show, "Synthetic Nature," was having its opening reception. But inside the Krause Gallery, we found no yarn, but instead encountered a knotted fort of inflated balloons. The installation was so large guests -- many of whom gathered outside -- had to nearly crawl to pass through the door, which was guarded by people decked from head to toe in balloon body-suits.

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Esther Zuckerman

​A few days ago we got a curious email from Olek, the crochet artist who has covered much of New York in colorful yarn. She's been in Europe for a while and did a couple shows in Poland recently.

"I hope you will have a great Holiday season this year," Olek wrote. "I will be spending it in the Crown Court in London fighting for my freedom."

We read on and clicked the link that Olek provided to her new website. This is the statement that was approved by her lawyer:

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Olek

Olek's Polish installation.

​Olek, an artist who is dear to our hearts, has crocheted pretty much everything: grocery carts, bikes, the Astor Place cube, the Wall Street bull. She has done it in London, and she recently did an outdoor installation for an art festival in Poznan, Poland. At the Polish festival, two teenage boys vandalized Olek's installation, as teenage boys are wont to do, first by attempting to rip off the yarn and then burning it.

Olek was unfazed!

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Yarn artist Olek frequently covers bikes and cars in colorful crocheted coats -- she even made us a present once! Sometimes her projects are even more ambitious than that, like the time that she made the Wall Street bull a new coat. Now that the weather's growing colder, Olek's gotten even more ambitious: over the weekend she made a covering for the Astor Place cube.

@bomarrblog via Bowery Boogie

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Esther Zuckerman

​If you read Runnin' Scared regularly, you'll know that we have a thing for yarn art. Unfortunately, it's made it onto Neil Genzlinger's list in the Times this weekend of things in NYC that should be banned. He'd like to ban pan flutes, for example, and fedoras (we endorse this one), "anyone caught using a cellphone," and twin strollers containing only one baby -- and "yarn bombing": More >>

Esther Zuckerman

​It's been an Olek kind of week! After she made the Village Voice a present, Jen and I headed to the opening of her show at Jonathan LeVine Gallery last night. It's called "The Bad Artists Imitate, The Great Artists Steal," a variation on a Pablo Picasso quote appropriated by the street artist Banksy. In one piece hanging on one of the gallery's walls (and shown in the photo to the right), Olek has crocheted those words into a backdrop of camouflage, attributed them to Picasso, crossed out his name, attributed them to Banksy, and then crossed out his name and attributed them to herself. Check out our photos after the jump.

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