Downtown Keeps Its Former Color with Grafitti Art

In the Meatpacking District, Oscar Mayer has been replaced with Oscar de la Renta. The area has quickly become one of the most trendy and expensive places to see and be seen in New York.

Once a haven for social deviants and sexual experimenters of the 1980s—think less “free love,” more S and M bondage—the Meatpacking District now looks like the cover of a glossy fashion magazine. Elite nightclubs and designer stores litter every corner like fast food franchises, sans the Dollar Menu. The neighborhood even has its own Web site brandishing the logo “MPD” that looks like it belongs on the side of a sneaker.

Fortunately, the glittery touch of posh restaurants and the models who don’t eat at them have not completely penetrated the dark alleyways past Ninth Avenue. Traces of the Meatpacking’s previous life may still exist in the plethora of graffiti that line the sidewalks like paintings in an art gallery.

On Little West 12th Street between Ninth Avenue and Washington Street—right beside the hoppin’ Cielo Night Club and a slightly less hoppin’ ATM—stands an iconic image accredited to the famous English graffiti artist Banksy. In front of a violently red backdrop, a man in Charlie Chaplin-esque attire kneels beside a metal detonator hooked up to a rat that hangs in midair several inches above him. Streams of neon pink and green paint shoot out of the animal’s body with such dynamic force that the sound of the explosion seems to ring in the air. The scene provides a brief reminder of the dangerous excitement that defined Old New York—a New York that past generations speak of with nostalgia and slight disdain, and that new generations wish they could have experienced. But then with a stiletto step to the right the memory is gone, drowned out by techno and $14 cosmos.

One longs for the graffiti in Meatpacking to offer a much-needed ironic, if not diabolic, touch to the Disneyland of urban life—but somehow it falls short. A few blocks from the Banksy, a striking wall displays a soldier holding a gun that fires splashes of colorful spray-paint. The piece seems like a novelty at first, but could easily be part of the ostentatious window display at Diane von Furstenberg’s mega store around the corner.

Even individual graffiti tags and a bubble letter “LOVE” sign scream out like brand items and fit right in with the neighborhood’s decorum. Packing trendy in the Meatpacking is not just about experiencing high-end nightlife, but also about cultivating a chic and hip persona—“Become a celebrity by association” might be the perfect ad slogan. While its artistic merit cannot be denied, graffiti is a product of this consumer pop culture and an intrinsic part of Meatpacking’s cool façade. Yet to reject something so imbedded in society brings up a whole other slew of cliché labels (hipster, anyone?). So saunter down the alleyways, view the graffiti, maybe even splurge on a hamburger—just don’t drink too much of the Kool-Aid.