Postcards & Billboard Project: Chinatown, NYC

The Postcards & Billboard Project: Chinatown, NYC takes the lower Manhattan area as a structural site and context. Taking in mind the perpetual tourist attraction that this area provides, as well as the constant reconstruction and construction projects that abound, CLANCCO decided to relate these two happenings into one project.

The project’s main focus was to make the reconstruction and construction process available to the local and international audience via two traditional touristic mediums: postcards and billboards.

First, CLANCCO obtained photographic images of reconstruction and construction sites from the Chinatown area. These photographic images were then transferred to postcards and made available at local tourist shops.

Secondly, certain images available through postcards were then transferred to a billboard within Chinatown off Canal Street.

One such image made available on postcards as well as the billboard was of a renovation project taking place above The Flea Theater, at 41 White Street.

The billboard image was installed as close as possible in time to the actual renovation taking place at 41 White Street.

(Billboard with original Chinese advertisement, before installation)

(Billboard, after installation, with renovation site image)

In effect, tourists to New York City’s Chinatown District were now able to personally view and send friends and relatives images of structural ghosts, visible to some, invisible to others, yet perpetually present.

Copyright © 1997- 2006 Sergio Muñoz-Sarmiento. All Rights Reserved.