Red Hook: I coulda been a contenda

Actual Size: 120" X 36"

Studio Exercise: Reclaiming Brooklyn's Industrial Waterfront

With its proximity to Lower Manhattan and downtown Brooklyn, panoramic views of the New York skyline, passionate and engaged residents, and colorful history (most famously portrayed as the setting of the splendid 1954 film, On The Waterfont), Red Hook is positioned to be one of New York’s best neighborhoods. In recent decades, it has spawned a unique culture surrounding art, sport and food, and has retained a functioning maritime industrial waterfront economy for over 75 years.

However, Red Hook has many hurdles to realizing its potential. It is underpopulated and underserved by transit and amenities. It is physically isolated and automobile dependent, cut off from the rest of New York by water and the hulking Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. Median income of its residents is sharply below the rest of Brooklyn, and unemployment is over 20%. Its building stock and industrial landscape are decaying. Although the harbingers of gentrification have begun to creep into Red Hook, it remains largely in stasis, poised on the brink of transformation but unsure of its post-industrial future.