Mike Fitelson

Part of "Message Delayed"

Washington Heights photographer Mike Fitelson is taking Facebook status updates and instant photo sharing and turning them upside down.

That is, he is taking the process of sharing thoughts and photos online and slowing it down and simplifying it dramatically -- and bringing the whole thing off line. It's part of a year-long project he is unveiling tomorrow at a street festival in his neighborhood.

The effort began last June at the Carnaval del Boulevard festival uptown. Fitelson, previously an associate publisher at northern Manhattan's community newspaper, the Manhattan Times, stopped neighborhood residents passing by, took portrait shots of them, and asked them each a simple question: "What's on your mind?"

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Sam Levin

Mayor Bloomberg and DOT Commissioner Sadik-Khan watch the "Python" fill a pothole in Queens.

Outdoor press conference!

Taking a break from his typical indoor news conferences, Mayor Mike Bloomberg today took advantage of the absurdly beautiful March weather outside to unveil a new pothole filling machine and to launch "road paving season," when the city resurfaces streets across the five boroughs. (Fixing roads, i.e. totally the best part about spring).

Reporters gathered around the "Python" on a blocked-off street in Flushing, Queens this morning to watch as a Department of Transportation worker demonstrated how this new piece of technology fills in potholes. The Python, a truck that basically unloads fresh material over a hole in the street and flattens it out, is designed to fill holes with fewer crew members and only block one lane of traffic during repairs.

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Jason Lewis

Last weekend we brought your attention to RETNA's mural on Bowery and Houston, but in the week that has past most of the city's artistic focus has been off the streets and into the various fairs participating in Armory Arts Week. But that's not the case for British street artist D*Face who took to SoHo and Brooklyn this week to construct three large-scale murals. Though not totally isolated from the week's festivities -- D*Face's work is being shown by the Corey Helford Gallery at the SCOPE New York Art Show -- the artist explained why he relishes the opportunity to paint in the open and engage with a broad audience, beyond just those that might choose to go to an art fair.

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Photo © 2012 Mark Rifkin/twi-ny.com

A new muralist is taking work to Bowery and Houston, following FAILE's creation installed in October. On Thursday Bowery Boogie blogged that the FAILE was in the midst of being painted over in white. Now, artist RETNA -- Marquis Lewis -- comes to the location, working in his signature style.

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Who should get credit for a mural of Biggie Smalls designed by a 21-year-old Parsons student and painted by artists CERN and Lee Quinones? The mural was commissioned by the owner of Habana Outpost in Fort Greene, and features the famous Che Guevara photo that adorns a million t-shirts with the Notorious B.I.G. in place of the Cuban revolutionary.

CERN painted the mural onto the wall, and Lee Quinones painted the pigeons that surround it. But now Parsons student John Garcia is saying that he should receive credit for submitting the original design (if "original" is the right word in this case).

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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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courtesy The Art Hustle

THIS JERK OF ART HAS NO STREET CRED

It's been a monumental week in the Suckadelic quest for world domination. Last Wednesday, the Sucklord found himself unceremoniously banished from BRAVO's Work of Art, after the endearing reality-TV character failed to impress judges in a street-art challenge. The masked Voice cover star's immediate real-world response was to flip his failure into a commercial win by releasing a Morgan Phillips born-loser action figure that mocked the Sucklord persona versus the person, his nationally televised loss, and the absurdity of a contrived competition, all in a three-inch resin sculpture. But that's not all.

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BRAVO

Tewz on Work of Art

One of the more intriguing aspects of Work of Art, the BRAVO reality show we've been following, is that the show's producers chose a handful of cast members who'd already had a presence in the world, whose self-propelled careers could exist apart from the reality-television lens. Along with Sucklord, who's semi-miraculously managed to survive four rounds, there's also Tewz 1, an accomplished street artist, painter, musician, urban explorer, printmaker (and a lot more) from Chicago whose work tends to get lumped into the lowbrow-art genre. Last week's episode saw Tewz's dismissal from the contest, along with Sucklord emotionally defending his pal's piece before the judge firing squad. (In true Sucklish: "I think this thing has balls!") We spoke with Tewz about making a friend cry, his pal Sucklord, and how Work of Art was a little like jail.

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Artist Norman Kirby's sculpture, "Figure Sleeping on the Ground," depicts a body curled up beneath a blanket. It now lives in Zuccotti Park with the hundreds of flesh and blood Occupy Wall Street protesters, and Kirby says he was inspired to make it after spending one night in the park. "It was one of the roughest things I've ever experienced," Kirby says. It's a good reminder that while the snow and wind may ruin your costume tonight, the protesters will be sleeping outside as the weather rages. Video interview with Norman Kirby after the jump.

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Rosie Gray

Say goodbye to French artist J.R.'s mural which was up on the corner of Bowery and Houston for four months, and hello to a new work that's currently being installed. The mural is by a duo called Faile (real names are Patrick McNeil and Patrick Miller). More photos after the jump.

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