The Westside Views project started in 1989 at the initiative of the artist Nitza Tufiño (1949). In the project, paintings by Nitza Tufiño or students from Grosvenor Neighborhood House and Manhattan Community Board 7 were placed.
In the project, the students went out into the streets of the city and photographed historical places or interviewed people from the community. From these photographs were created the ceramic paintings that have been displayed at the station ever since.
A view of the platform where some of the paintings can be seen in the following photo taken by the same photographer on the same day
Click for a larger image The following picture shows one of the pictures and its relative position on the wall of platform
Click for a larger image The photos taken at Line 1 platform, North were taken on the same day by the same photographer
Clarisa Urena -
Click for a larger image Click for a larger image Click for a larger image - Wanda Buffill
Click for a larger image - Ana Velez
Click for a larger image Click for a larger image Click for a larger image Click for a larger image Click for a larger image Click for a larger image Click for a larger image Click for a larger image - Clarisa Urena
Click for a larger image - Alberto Batista
Click for a larger image Click for a larger image Click for a larger image Click for a larger image - Sharon Giles
Click for a larger image In addition, the song "West Side Poem" and the song "The Next Station" written by Pedro Pietri also appear
WESTSIDE POEM
Uptown, downtown sights & sounds
From 110th to 59th Street,
The heart of the westside beats.
Making plaques to make a point,
Giving life to useless joint.
Underground there is no light,
Turn a journey into flight -
Here,
upon these walls
Lies the laughter and the calls
Westside life has two meanings,
It is here that we are seeming.
To combine the dull and gleaming
Uptown, downtown, people dreaming
Stopping, looking, observing!
People are amazed,
People are in a daze,
Children are playing.
Running and saying:
Yeh! Yeh! Yeh!
Uptown, donwontown, underground,
People waiting for a train
That already came -
People riding
People sitting.
Hiding behind newspaper headlines,
While others are standing
Holding onto straphangers
NEXT STOP
86th Street and Broadway.
Stop watching the door that opens
And closes and closes and opens
...And check out the murals
Illustrating activilies
Occurring on the westside vicinity
People windowshopping,
People stopping for a red light,
People going for a stroll,
Children playing on a stoop,
Senior citizens running for a bus
Paying half fare to go nowhere.
Somewhere on 86th Street
There’s a Blimpie’s on the corner!
Walking downtown
On the uptown side of the street,
An ambulance siren is heard,
Dogs are curbed and pigeons are fed,
Peanuts or breadcrumbs or metaphor.
Frankfurter vendors
Are a familiar sight
To people coming and going
From supermarkets & clothing store
Where now Chinese is spoken fluently
By everlasting smiling Latins.
From the westside of Manhattan’s
Multi-cultural cosmopolitan scene.
Fulltime park resident dozes off,
Staring at orange pumpkins
From horse driven technicolor dream
In a mental Central Park
Afternoon scene of lunch breakers.
Uptown, downtown,
Above ground, life after life,
Street vendors making a living
Near movie theaters & historical sites
Displaying broad daylight statues.
Looking up
Looking down,
Activities all around
Where Spanish & Greck,
Hebrew, Arabic & French,
Russian, Irish & Italian,
Blends harmoniously
Inside neon hero sandwich
Of foreign domestic language!
You will always recognize
Someone you know
And have never met before,
Or after you complete
that short walk
To fruit & vegetable stands.
A close up of a building stoop,
Children playing in the sandbox,
A clown to make you smile.
And if you look straight up to
The sky that meets the naked eye,
When you come back down to earth
You will still be on the WESTSIDE!
Poet- Pedro Pietri
Student Muralist
Click for a larger image