Art History Artist Tracing Real Estate Dealings in Nyc

James Nevius is the writer of three books about New York City, the most contempo of which is Footprints in New York: Tracing the Lives of Four Centuries of New Yorkers .

Installation view of America Is Difficult to Encounter (Whitney Museum of American Fine art, New York, May 1— September 27, 2015): Hans Haacke, Shapolsky, et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, a Real Estate Holdings, a Real-Time Social System, equally of May i 1971, 1971, (2007.148a-gg). Photography past Ronald Amstutz.

No real manor topic—not even "poor doors" or mega skyscrapers—engenders more than vehement fence in New York City than gentrification. The narrative is familiar: in neighborhood after neighborhood, older, poorer tenants—both residential and commercial—are forced out past rising rents and new construction. Inevitably, they are replaced by well-heeled residents, large banks, and at least one Starbucks. In some neighborhoods, the rate of change is staggering. Take, for example, the Meatpacking District, where the success of the High Line—which wasn't even under structure a decade ago—has spawned a luxury building blast. While the park itself is an emblem of gentrification, information technology's the new Whitney Museum at the park's Gansevoort Street terminus that serves equally the electric current bellwether of the expanse'due south transformation. A handful of bodily meat packing plants can still be spied from the museum'south outdoor terraces, but the neighborhood's namesakes will likely soon exist gone completely.

However, on a recent visit to the new Whitney, my eye was caught past a unlike barometer of gentrification—a sign that in other neighborhoods, alter is tiresome, and sometimes less visible from the street than it might initially announced. On the 5th floor, I was delighted to detect a piece that the museum rarely displayed in its old Madison Avenue dwelling: Hans Haacke'southward conceptual artwork, Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, A Existent Fourth dimension Social System, every bit of May 1, 1971, which is amongst the creative person'south best-known and most controversial pieces. Though gentrification wasn't Haacke'due south chief concern when he created the piece of work in 1971, the slice serves as a jumping-off betoken for examining how neighborhoods like the East Village and the Lower East Side have evolved over the last four and a half decades. What surprised me nigh, equally I compared Haacke's 1971 work with the realities of the Lower East Side today, was how much—at to the lowest degree superficially—had stayed the same.

Hans Haacke ( b. 1936). Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Existent Estate Holdings, a Real‑Time Social System, as of May 1, 1971, (1971).

Born in Federal republic of germany in 1936, Hans Haacke's early work with the collective Zero in the early 1960s paved the manner both for his embrace of nontraditional materials and his involvement in using fine art to comment on—and influence—political debate. In 1970, for a group show at the Museum of Modern Art, Haacke's piece MoMA Poll was simply two Plexiglas containers where museum-goers could register their opinion on Governor Nelson Rockefeller'southward politics—a direct critique of both the war in Vietnam and of the Museum's founder.

The next twelvemonth, Haacke turned his attention to housing in New York City and began work on Shapolsky et al. His concept was deceptively simple just required an incredible amount of legwork. In 1971, he undertook to map out the holdings of prolific existent manor investor Harry J. Shapolsky, who at the tiptop of his career had owned every bit many equally 200 tenements in Harlem, the East Village, and the Lower East Side. Using public records, Haacke painstakingly unearthed the dozens of trounce corporations that Shapolsky and his relatives had created to command properties around the city. Haacke and so photographed each property and presented his findings—142 buildings in all—as gelatin silvery prints, each accompanied by a dossier of facts: the edifice's address, block and lot number, lot size, and building type. Below that was information on ownership: corporate entity, date of acquisition, price of the mortgage, the names of which of Shapolsky's associates were involved, and the assessed land value. (The thought of doing this for 142 buildings before the Internet makes my caput spin.)

Hans Haacke ( b. 1936). Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, a Existent‑Time Social System, as of May 1, 1971, (1971).

This piece, along with its lesser-known companion, Sol Goldman and Alex DiLorenzo Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, a Real-Fourth dimension Social Arrangement, as of May 1, 1971, were to be centerpieces of a Haacke retrospective at the Guggenheim in 1971—a remarkable accomplishment for an artist who was only about a decade into his career. But the Guggenheim'southward manager, Thomas Messer, was wary of the political overtones of these works. Six weeks prior to the show's opening, he demanded that Haacke pull the pieces. In a letter, Messer outlined his main objection: the Guggenheim's policies "exclude active engagement toward social and political ends." Some speculated that Messer was by and large worried about backlash from Shapolsky, Goldman, and DiLorenzo (the latter two were amid the city'south biggest commercial existent estate investors, with a portfolio that included the Chrysler Edifice). When Haacke refused to self-censor, Messer fired the prove'due south curator, Edward Fry, and cancelled the exhibition, instantly cementing Haacke's status as a provocateur and an creative person to be reckoned with. Over a hundred prominent colleagues refused to show at the Guggenheim in solidarity with Haacke—and to protest the idea that their work, should information technology exist selected for show, was therefore beingness de facto labeled apolitical or sufficiently inoffensive.

Haacke's critique of Harry Shapolsky did non make the artist some sort of outlier. The New York District Chaser had referred to Shapolsky every bit "notorious" and "ruthlessly" exploitive. Every bit early every bit 1947, the New York Times called Shapolsky out by name in connection with an investigation into the city's housing authority that resulted in the firing of its construction superintendent. In the late 1950s, Shapolsky was brought up on charges of being a front man for building department officials. Allegedly, Shapolsky had $216,000 in hidden depository financial institution accounts. Was he using this to pay off city inspectors? Or was he laundering the coin for officials who were taking payoffs? Either way, Shapolsky was sentenced to 30 days in jail and a $250 fine. A year afterwards, he was convicted of rent gouging. In 1966, New York State passed a bill to include slumlords' identities in the public tape—they could no longer simply hide backside phony corporations. This law surely helped Haacke in his quest to reveal just how deep the Shapolsky family'due south reach was in Manhattan real estate.

At right, Hans Haacke's photograph of 110-112 St. Mark's Place. Hans Haacke ( b. 1936). Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, a Real‑Time Social System, equally of May 1, 1971, (1971).

Westwardhile gentrification in the East Village has not followed the same rapid arc as in the Meatpacking Commune, it has been no less dramatic. On blogs like EV Grieve, Bowery Boogie, and Jeremiah's Vanishing New York, which relate the irresolute face of the city, the sense of loss is palpable. Every time a place like Mars Bar comes downwardly to exist replaced by a "12-story prison-block of an flat building," one can't help but wonder how much sense of place is existence lost.

To that end, I decided to take the portrait of the East Village Hans Haacke created in Shapolsky, et al., and set out to see how different the neighborhood is today from how it appeared on May 1, 1971. (I narrowed my quest down to the East Hamlet so every bit to make it a more manageable task as well equally to acknowledge that changes in the Lower E Side south of Houston and in Harlem accept followed somewhat dissimilar trajectories.) In all, Haacke photographed 55 buildings in the surface area bounded by Broadway, 14th Street, the East River, and Houston—more than a tertiary of his total project.

Walking east from Astor Place, my first goal was 110-112 St. Mark's Place (correct). I hoped this was going to turn out to be the tenement on the embrace of Led Zeppelin's Physical Graffiti, only no such luck; information technology's the same cake, just a few doors down. As I walked toward 2nd Avenue, I wondered how much of the street remained the same from 1971. Certainly, in Haacke's day, there was no Chipotle or Pinkberry, and it's piece of cake to wallow in a in that location-goes-the-neighborhood vibe, peculiarly with the loss of long-term tenants like Trash and Vaudeville. But that sentiment isn't new. In 1971, just a couple of months later on Haacke's Guggenheim show was to have opened, the Village Voice was lamenting the change on "St. Marker's Identify from a hippie oasis to Pathos Row":

The rest of the scene is going the wearisome way of the [recently closed] Electric Circus, from excitement to doldrums to death. Even Gem'southward Spa, the archetype egg cream and paper emporium on the corner, is feeling the vanquish. A permanent cluster of junkies using its doorways and paper benches as home base hasn't helped business organisation any. Residents of the expanse, in fact, give St. Mark's Place a couple of years. Outside estimates say five. The East Hamlet past that time, they say, will accept returned to its former incarnation. Already the kids on the street refer to the expanse every bit "the neighborhood," or the Lower East Side. I can't recall the concluding time I heard anyone talk well-nigh a community. Simply every bit I examined the buildings themselves, I realized the landscape hasn't changed much. That Chipotle is located in Arlington Hall, the old social gild that in one case housed the Electric Circus. Across the street is the Hamilton-Holly House, one time home to Alexander Hamilton's widow. In fact, I was hard pressed to find whatsoever edifice that wouldn't have been standing in 1971, and by the time I got to 110-112 St. Marking's, it didn't surprise me to see that it was still there—and, for a edifice in one case endemic by a slumlord, not in bad shape. True: one of the building'southward two retail spaces was shuttered, its metallic pull-down grate covered in graffiti, only the other restaurant was hawking crepes.

227 Avenue B. Hans Haacke ( b. 1936). Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, a Real‑Time Social System, as of May 1, 1971, (1971).

Over the next few hours, equally I wandered the streets of the East Village comparing addresses to the photos from Shapolsky et al., I encountered this scenario over and over: the nigh visible changes—if there were whatever at all—were cleaner buildings and changes in retail. The one-time makes sense: New York is a much less polluted metropolis than information technology was in the early 1970s, when coal boilers were nonetheless prevalent and leaded gasoline filled many tanks. The latter is just the normal life wheel of business organization, though one tin't assistance but be wistful looking at Haacke'due south documentation of places long gone: Weissman'south Ladies & Children's Wear at 227 Artery B (now Medilane Drugs, with signs in English, Chinese, and Spanish); Dalton's Luncheonette next door at 229 Avenue B (at present a bodega) and Ya-Ya'southward diner side by side to that.

The most architecturally intriguing observe was 538-40 East 11th Street, which in 1971 had been abode to the warehouse of Zambrana Bros, a wholesale grocery. The neo-Renaissance facade is adorned with nautical symbols, including Neptune's trident, and an inscription carved across the top reveals its original utilize: FREE PUBLIC BATHS OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK. The building was erected [PDF] in 1904 past architect Arnold W. Brunner (perhaps best known in New York for designing Congregation Shearith Israel on the Upper West Side) at a time when the lack of indoor plumbing in many tenements was condign a huge problem. Congenital to serve the German-American community that surrounded Tompkins Square Park, the facility included 7 bathtubs (five for women; ii for men) and 97 "rain baths" (now known equally showers).

At left, Haacke's photograph of 538-forty East 11th Street, the old Zambrana Bros warehouse. Hans Haacke ( b. 1936). Shapolsky et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, a Real‑Time Social System, equally of May 1, 1971, (1971).

After 1929, tenements were required to have a bath or shower in each unit, and bathhouses waned in popularity—though this one however drew over 130,000 people in 1958, the year it was finally closed past the city. After sitting vacant for iii years, Harry Shapolsky acquired it at auction on April xx, 1961, for $19,500 (+/- $150,000 in today's dollars). A decade later, when Hans Haacke took his photograph, the land and building combined were worth $35,000 (+/- $200,000 now). In 1995, the late photographer Eddie Adams purchased the building equally his studio, renovating the 10,000 square feet into a work/alive space. His widow still owns the infinite, which various property websites estimate is valued in the $5 to $7 million range.

And therein lies the real gentrification, which isn't about boutique shops or even new structure. Virtually of the buildings are withal the same ones that were built over a century agone for immigrant New Yorkers, but those immigrants would faint at the prices. I contacted Ada Calhoun, author of the forthcoming volume St Marks is Dead: The Many Lives of America'southward Hippest Street who grew up on St Marks Place in the 1970s. She remembered

leaning out our front window on humid summer nights to see fires called-for to the eastward—abased buildings reportedly being burned for the insurance money. So many buildings in our neighborhood were boarded up, and there were empty lots in betwixt a lot of them (some of which are now community gardens). I wasn't allowed to play in Tompkins Foursquare Park because it was overrun with junkies.

Today, I can't afford to live in the Eastward Village...only I can take my son to play in Tompkins Square Park when we visit his grandparents. The streets are teeming with pedestrians 24 hours a day. Calhoun's parents paid about $200 a month; classified ads from the early 1970s show rents in the Due east Village ranging from a two bedroom for $65 in Alphabet City to $150 for places farther due west. Using the most bourgeois calculations, that $150 should exist virtually $1,460 today. But rents in the Eastward Village are nowhere about that low. In 110-112 St Marks Identify, where I started my walk, the virtually recent listing was for a two-sleeping accommodation at $3,500. In Steal This Book, Abbie Hoffman noted that in 1971, that building on St. Marks was dwelling house to the undercover paper, The New York Herald, a lifetime subscription to which could be had for just $5.

Today'due south East Village is a different identify: underground newspapers are gone, the junkies are (mostly) gone, and the streets, as Calhoun notes, are a magnet for people. Equally for the slumlords? That's another story.

Of the fifty-five buildings Haacke documented in the East Village, 18 are gone and 37 are still standing. None are owned past the Shapolsky family any longer. Offset in 1974, New York'due south housing prices began to feel a period of decline [PDF] that mirrored the overall downturn in the city. Many landlords defaulted on property taxes and buildings ended up vacant or in the easily of the urban center—merely not those owned by Harry Shapolsky. Researching the eighteen Shapolsky buildings that are gone, I constitute that in each case, the property was sold by one of Shapolsky'due south property companies in the early 1970s to someone else (many, but not all, to beau slumlord Linton Campbell), and it was the new owner who and then defaulted within a year or two.

But fifty-fifty though Shapolsky was able to keep upwards with his mortgage payments and taxes, the East Village rental marketplace in the 1970s couldn't take been making him much money. By the early 1980s—but equally housing prices finally began to rise—Shapolsky had sold nearly every edifice that Haacke photographed. In doing then, Shapolsky missed out on a real estate boom. Just as i example: Haacke included a tenement at 280-82 East tenth Street that Shapolsky had purchased outright (under the guise of the 177 Mulberry Realty Corporation) in 1958 from the heirs of its previous owner, Herman Segal. Its value in 1971 was $65,000 (+/- $380,000 today). Harry Shapolsky sold the property in 1979 for an undisclosed amount, but it was mortgaged v years subsequently for $135,000. Two years later, in 1986, when the holding inverse hands once more, the mortgage was up to $499,600, and the virtually recent mortgage, in 2011, was for $1.3 meg. The assignment of leases and rents for the building (the corporeality the bank can claim if the mortgage is in default) is $3.five million. Multiply that by the number of buildings Haacke documented in the E Village and the corporeality of money that has been infused into this once downwardly-and-out neighborhood is staggering.

But some people are still feeling the squeeze.

As I was heading east to check out 280 East 10th Street, I noticed a sign posted on a street lamp emblazoned "Alert - Croman / 9300 Realty - Warning." Put upward past the Terminate Croman Coalition, the flyer warned potential renters in the neighborhood to be wary of Steve Croman's network of properties. "Wait at the YELP reviews," the flyer cautioned, with "comments like 'BEWARE' and 'WARNING' and 'NO! NO! NO!'"

Steve Croman, as Curbed noted before this year, is one of the most hated landlords in the city. Voted #8 on the Village Voice poll of the "Ten Worst New York City Landlords of 2014," his tactics include "initiating pointless lawsuits," ignoring items in need of repair, and refusing to renew leases, "all in an endeavour to drive [tenants] out of their rent-stabilized leases." Seeing an electronic mail accost on the flyer, I contacted the End Croman Coalition, who sent over a listing of his properties, titled "Croman's Kingdom," which I immediately uploaded into my Shapolsky database to see if any properties matched. None were the same, but an overlay of the Croman backdrop onto a map of what Shapolsky had owned in 1971 shows that Croman's empire occupies essentially the aforementioned infinite as Shapolsky'southward—sometimes the buildings he owns are practically side-by-side with those documented by Hans Haacke.

When Cynthia Chaffee at the Stop Croman Coalition emailed me, she noted that Steve Croman is the

poster boy for landlord greed and he set up the template for all the other slumlords to follow in his footsteps….

In the 70's the slumlords hired goons to commit arson...but today information technology'due south much more sophisticated and the landlord'due south goons are their lawyers, who apply the courts to harass tenants and have them evicted. They drag out court cases trying to article of clothing downwardly tenants emotionally and financially.... They as well employ demolitions/gut renovations in their buildings to harass tenants out of their homes, forcing tenants to live in hazardous conditions blanketed in toxic renovation dust and debris and making them sick.

319 East Fifth Street

One of Harold Shapolsky's buildings was 319 East 5th Street, a nondescript five-story walkup that still stands. Iii doors down (and right next door to the 9th Precinct) is Steve Croman's 325 East 5th Street, a tenement of the same era. Looking at the 2 buildings side-by-side, there's picayune to distinguish the one owned by a notorious slumlord from 45 years agone and one owned by a man who "seems to almost please in playing the role of the villainous landlord."

That's when it struck me that someone could hands create Croman, et al. Manhattan Real Estate Holdings, A Real Time Social Organisation, as of 2015. Photo the buildings, impress them as gelatin silver prints, pair them with the data mined for "Croman'southward Kingdom" and hang information technology up next to Hans Haacke'south groundbreaking work of fine art. Despite all the many changes in the E Hamlet in the last iv-and-a-half decades, a casual museum-goer would not necessarily know which was Haacke's work and which was the homage.

· Whitney Museum coverage [Curbed]
· The Strange History of the East Hamlet'south Most Famous Street [Curbed NY]
· Curbed Features archive [Curbed]

washingtonhapromeen.blogspot.com

Source: https://archive.curbed.com/2015/9/2/9924926/hans-haacke-photography-slumlord