New York is home to the most prestigious museums in the world, but even still, sometimes the most moving art here isn’t on gallery walls.
A lot of the time, it’s right on the NYC streets.
This is definitely the case with Brooklyn-based artist, illustrator and designer Gavin Snider. He runs an Instagram account, cleverly named @GavinDeDraw, where he shares colored sketches of different parts of NYC, and details the special feel of the scene as he works in his captions.
For example, for the below illustration of Doyers Street in Chinatown he wrote, “Doyers Street is one of those special New York streets that you can step onto and be transported back in time. I’m standing between construction cones, dodging mail trucks that can barely turn the corner and groups on guided tours. I catch a few details from the tour guide. They called it Murder Alley, the Bloody Angle. A network of tunnels runs beneath us. The narrow, winding path may have once hosted an underworld of crime, but it’s pretty quiet today. Families wait in line for dumplings. Barbers and cooks and shopkeepers take cigarette breaks on folding chairs.”
It really helps you appreciate the little moments in New York, and all the magic that happens on a daily basis if you just stop to take a long look!
Here’s a view facing north in Chelsea, from brick building lined streets to the height and glass of Hudson Yards in the background:
And here, a classic Lower East Side scene.
The perfect view of the Coney Island Ferris Wheel on a summer’s day…
And we have to say, Delmonico’s looks even better under construction in this version!
featured image source: Instagram / @gavindedraw