It’s Party Time! The Annual Party on Park, organized by Uptown Grand Central, took place on Sunday, September 22nd from Noon to 4:00pm. The Event went from 116th Street to 125th Street, along Park Avenue. If you didn’t make it this year, check out a few photos below.
This third edition of the neighborhood event will include two extra blocks of fun, and it will be the last day of the GrandScale Mural Project, where visitors will have a chance to meet artists working on the final section of the construction walls.
The Uni Project has been a regular at Uptown Grand Central under the viaduct on 125th Street, so it was no surprise to see The Uni Project with a large presence at Party on Park. Their Lego building table appeared to be a big hit with young and old.
Citibike has also been a regular at Uptown Grand Central Events. Now with several stations nearby, including a large Citibike station along Park Avenue between 124/125th Streets, they were on site offering discounted or free trial memberships, free rides during Party on Park, and free helmets!
Below, old school jam featuring D.J. Tedsmooth The Remix King.
On each block, under the viaduct from 116th to 125th Streets, tents were set up, manned by local businesses and non-profits like Ralph Lauren Cancer Center handing out nutritional information, Harlem Neighborhood Health Action Center, the Reduced Fare Bike Share presented by Healthfirst, Councilwoman Diana Ayala, the Marcus Garvey Park Alliance and many many more. We spotted Manhattan Borough President, Gale Brewer enjoying the festivities all along Park Avenue.
One of the five sanitation trucks from the project, Trucks of Art was on view along with a Sanitation Department table, offering information and answering questions.
A fabulous, and very popular, kids section was set up on 120th Street along with a giant bouncy-house and the coolest kids climbing wall we’ve ever seen (video on our Instagram).
On the corners of 119th Street and 120th Street, along Park Avenue, are two temporary art installations presented by Public Art Initiative, including (above and below) an attractive installation entitled EATME! by artist Capucine Boucarat, focusing on nutrition. On Bourcart’s table, as part of Party on Park, are pictures of every manner of fruit and vegetable ready for coloring, cutting and pasting ~ hung on the fence behind, along with the installation.
In the installation, EATME!, Bourcart takes a deep-dive into food options in the community, with bags of chips and cans of soda filling the shelves in local deli’s and bodega’s. Here, on the fence of the Eugene McCabe Playing Field, adjacent to PS 79, alternatives are suggested in living color on small metal square .
Public Art Initiative of Marcus Garvey Park Alliance, who is known for art installations with a message, along with public interactive programming, installed a table with a box full of easy-to-make recipe’s made with many of the suggested fruits, vegetables, grains and fish, all images that are part of the installation hanging on the fence. In addition, the Alliance set up a bowl of fruit and a huge box of chalk, ready for kids of all ages to sketch on the surrounding sidewalk and car-free Park Avenue.
Above, Connie Lee, President of Marcus Garvey Park Alliance and Public Art Initiative, creating the first of the healthy food images ~ en plein air.
Below, The Marcus Garvey Park Alliance table featuring a poster on the fence, of another in a series of Public Art Initiative installations, Roots on Fire by artist, Susan Stair ~ who is standing in the picture below, creating workshop activities for Party on Park kids.
The second of the Public Art Initiative installations on Park Avenue is a stunning fiber creation entitled La Flor De Mi Madre by artist, Naomi Lawrence, with her Party on Park tent below at 120th Street.
Lawrence’s installation is a creation of flowers representing the plethora of countries represented within the East Harlem Community ~ small Impala Lilly’s representing Ghana; a large Christmas Orchid representing Columbia; Bayahibe representing the Dominican Republic…..
Party on Park attendees stopped by her table (above) to learn the basics using colorful yarn ~ and visions of spectacular installations created by each one of them in their own homes.
Uptown Grand Central included in the Event their current project, UptownGrandScale ~ fifty artists painting on construction walls on either side of Park Avenue along 125th Street, down Park Avenue, and along 124th Street, with Party on Park being the last day of the UptownGrandScale project.
Party On Park was organized by Uptown Grand Central, with support from the Harlem Neighborhood Health Action Center, the Reduced Fare Bike Share presented by Healthfirst, and NYC Councilwoman Diana Ayala. Volunteers are provided by Positive Workforce, the Department for the Aging & people like you!
This was a Free Event, open to the public, and will be back next September, 2020 (we hope).
Save the Date for an Opening Reception for the art installation, Roots on Fire by artist Susan Stair ~ to be held in the Art Park in East Harlem, organized by the Public Art Initiative of Marcus Garvey Park ~ September 29th from 4-6pm.
Want more StreetArt? Check out The Mural Project and Graffiti in the Skyat 4 World Trade. View images from 2019 Graffiti Wall of Fame and El Barrio’s Guerrilla Wall on 116th Street + more.
Check out East 125th Street, a work in progress.