Christina Stahr

Going Under Broadway
Year: 2008
Medium: Mixed media collage with photography, aluminum leaf, gold leaf, and papers
Dimensions: 13 1/4"h x 15 1/4"w framed

Artist Statement:

"Going Under" is a long horizontal collage project that combines photography with papers and mixed media. 
Walking along Broadway, from home to the studio, my views are framed by the massive century-old iron beams that support the elevated number 1 subway line.  I took photographs through these structural "frames" to document my walks, and to record the buildings, restaurants, offices, pharmacies, the church, and activities underneath the bridge. This vital old neighborhood risks “going under” as the proposed new Columbia campus goes up.
The documentary clarity of the photos contrasts with the more expressive gestural painted and torn collage elements surrounding and partially obliterating them. I have lived here for 25 years. "Going Under" is not a nostalgic clinging onto a romanticized post-industrial landscape, but a fragmented panoramic view of all that will be obliterated by the changes engulfing this neighborhood, my neighborhood, on the western edge of Harlem.