Kneat!

Image via Sean Augustine March.

If you've ever walked around in the Lower East Side, you probably have come across a bike outfitted in an awesome bright-colored knit "sweater" parked outside of the Essex Street Market (below) until someone snipped it open. Now there's an entire car wrapped in the very same patterned knit. A whole car! 

Image from Bowery Boogie.

A little Google searching led us to the Bowery Boogie blog which revealed the artist behind this project. Her name is Olek and she knits around objects like the bike and the car, fruit, and even people (as per video below).


Olek describe her work in this eloquent paragraph:

I think crochet, the way I create it, is a metaphor for the complexity and interconnectedness of our body and its systems and psychology. The connections are stronger as one fabric as opposed to separate strands, but, if you cut one, the whole thing will fall apart. It’s also a literal extension of the body, a sort of second skin that can be stretched and reshaped by the body inner workings as it shapes or distorts that body. I can’t really speak to what I want to reveal—to know that, you’d have to find the end of the string and unravel it.


How beautiful. We're told the crocheted car resides on Elizabeth Street, somewhere in Soho. It's definitely worth a stroll around the neighborhood to locate this work of art.

--- VS

5 comments:

Unknown said...

The crocheted car is directly in front of the Christopher Henry Gallery, where Olek is having a solo show titled "Knitting is for Pus****" at 127 Elizabeth Street NYC(between Broome and Grand) come inside the gallery and you will see an entire room that Olek has covered with crochet!

Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Unknown said...

Uh, you missed the inside of the gallery where the car is parked. There's a room covered entirely (including the floor)in multi-colored crochet panels complete with crocheted bed, crocheted desk, crocheted chair, crocheted bookshelves, crocheted kitchen, crocheted ironing board, crocheted pedestal sink, crocheted clawfoot bathtub.....and even a crocheted toilet!!! A must see!!!

Unknown said...

Sounds amazing! Will definitely check it out. Thanks for the tip!

Unknown said...

What does the artist's statement mean in plain English? Sounds like art talk to me. A cozy is not a new art/craft concept.