Keeper of the bygone cityscape

11 May 2010

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Image credit: Photography by John Bartelstone

(The Atlantic)

A roaring zinc lion from the El Dorado carousel in Coney Island and a languorous allegorical figure of Night, carved of granite, from the iconic Pennsylvania Station complex designed by McKim, Mead & White, are a couple examples of important New York architectural fragments saved by a crusading art dealer.

For more than five decades, Ivan Tarp, the 83-year-old known for his role in promoting pop-art back in the 1960s, has been salvaging bits from buildings set for demolition. The self-described "rubble rouser" views the forsaken fragments as art and part of New York City history.

Karp, and his group called Anonymous Arts Recovery Society, has carried off thousands of late-Victorian stone and terra-cotta facade ornaments, and other treasures, that became part of a sculpture garden at the Brooklyn Museum. The museum has been de-accessioning some of this city architectural collection.

Read more at The Atlantic

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