(Photo by Dion Ogust)
It’s a complex wall at this point, the mash up of bits and pieces on the wall of the old Laundromat on Library Lane, which is pegged to come down in the coming year to be replaced by a sparkling new community-oriented Woodstock Library Annex. There’s tattering remnants of what look like old posters and other historical artifacts, until close inspection shows they’re all a spoof, albeit without any bad intent. Plus a growing number of large-scale doodlings, colorful additions, art posters and found materials that lend added beauty to what’s been morphing for a year, with considerable new activity in recent weeks.
Seeming to hold it all together is a No Trespassing notice from the Ulster County Sherriff’s office.
“That No Trespass sign was there first, from back when the building was seized for back taxes,” noted Library Director Amy Raff this week. “I never took it off because I liked it.”
The rest of the stuff has evolved, she added. First, Friends of Library member Michael Hunt, an artist with a penchant for poster media, started the series of faux posters and artifacts he calls “You’re In The Midst of It” over a year ago. Then someone “art bombed” the laundromat wall a year ago.
“I didn’t care; I thought it was cool,” Raff added. “Some people went to the artist who did the bombing and suggested it would be good for them to contact the library…and I gave them my blessing to continue.”
Anonymity was requested…part of the guerilla art ethos at play on the wall for the past year. But that has led many in town to start looking at some of Woodstock’s higher profile conceptual artists as suspects. After all, pop up art, both in terms of instantaneous galleries and high concept guerrilla art actions, has become something of a trend around Woodstock in recent years…at least as long as there are spaces awaiting new tenants, or rehabbing. Remember all the pieces around the Green over recent summers, yard bombing, or Will Lytle’s first cartoon books appearing here and there without forewarning or publicity of any kind?
Suffice it to say that the artist who’s been adorning and setting off Hunt’s calls “You’re In The Midst of It” pieces on the soon-to-be Woodstock Library Annex site, on this old wooden Laundromat wall, is not your usual suspect. But it’s someone who many will say “ah” to if and when they “come out.”
In the meantime, enjoy what’s transpiring…and remember those times when you or others have had the joy of transforming a soon-to-be-painted wall with scribbled notes, tic-tac-toe games, and drawings in a home. And when getting by to see this fun display, heed Raff’s beckoning call to stop in next door for warmth and some possible gift purchases of the Post Shelf Workshop pieces on sale this week…all made of reprocessed library materials. Think wreaths concocted from old books, ornaments, or a “bookmobile” sculpture made up o — what else — small books.
“We are an artists’ colony after all,” Raff summarized. “And this is temporary, like all things. I love that it’s become multi-layered. And most of all, that the artist who’s been doing it is inspired by what the Annex will be. That’s special.”