When the No. 7 subway emerges from beneath the East River on its way to the heart of Queens, a color-splashed former factory looms on the horizon like an apparition. As the train roars along an elevated platform past the building, passengers get a closer look at the block-long structure, a five-story building in Long Island City almost entirely covered with graffiti.
But this is not an abandoned building being tagged by teenagers. Its owner actually welcomes the art — at least for now. Jerry Wolkoff, who bought the property 36 years ago, is waiting for the real estate market to improve. But in the meantime, he said, the artists can do their thing.
“What most people call graffiti, I call aerosol art,” said Wolkoff, who owns several properties in the city and on Long Island. He’s allowed graffiti at the factory building bordered by Jackson Avenue, Crane and Davis streets for over a dozen years. “The artists have to go through a committee; it’s not just put up at random. And no one gets paid; it all comes from the heart.”
The pristine murals that cover the
prime spots are indeed of high caliber. The building, a 200,000-square-foot structure known as 5 Pointz, is a regular stop for top-flight artists from around the world.
Picture the dominant motif in the loading dock at the moment: figures with robot-like qualities vanquishing their enemies. Many murals consist of the tag of a particular artist, signatures that can be 5 feet high. Teams of artists climb over the roof looking for good spots — especially treasured are prominent locations between the building’s third and fourth floors.
“We’re not patrons of the arts, but we like to give back to the community, and this is one way to do it,” said Wolkoff’s son, David, who plans to commission a work by an aerosol artist that will hang on a large wall in his Upper East Side apartment.
Current manufacturing tenants and artists’ lofts cover the building’s taxes, maintenance and utilities.
“Eventually we will build there, but in the meantime, we’ll still let the artists go,” said Jerry Wolkoff. “We have some plans and renderings, but nothing concrete.”
The Wolkoffs visit two or three times a week. From the beginning, there has been a steadfast policy for artists: no nudity, politics, ethnic disparagement or other
negativity. They once painted over a mural that depicted a devil and a cross after someone complained.
The building’s aerosol program was founded in 1996 by Pat DeLillo, who called it the Phun Phactory. A former plumber who once worked as a community activist with the Graffiti Terminators, which painted over graffiti works around Queens, DeLillo realized that he couldn’t beat graffiti artists, so he decided to join them and champion their work.
The Wolkoffs gave him the keys to the castle that is 5 Pointz based on a handshake and a promise — not a dime changed hands. DeLillo established the practice of issuing painting permits and also started giving tasks to kids passing through the court
system who were required to perform
community service. More importantly, he provided a space for the artists to promote their talent.
Aerosol artists, known for their stealth and outlaw ethos, rarely get the chance to craft large, well-executed murals, called “pieces” in the genre’s parlance, to differentiate the better work from crude and indiscriminate markings, derided as “bombing” or “tagging.”
Now, in the stairwells and other nooks, artwork fills the walls. The best work is to be found in the loading dock, at eye level along the sidewalks, and on a fence at the back of the dead-end block, which faces a nexus of rail lines for the 7 train, Amtrak and the Long Island Rail Road.
Admittedly, it took a while for this
corner of Queens to accept the concept of legal street art. DeLillo and his artists
routinely ran afoul of the police and the Queens DA’s office, which had difficulty understanding that the artists had the building owner’s blessing.
The program’s current administrator, Jonathan Cohen, known as Meres, took over in 2002 after DeLillo moved to Pennsylvania. Cohen, who is certified by the Board of Education, offers classes, cultivates his own career as an artist and curates the offerings at the Wolkoff building, which he dubbed 5 Pointz after the city’s five boroughs.
Depending on the quality and the reputation of the aerosol artist, pieces can stay up for as long as several months, especially in the coveted loading dock area, where even dumpsters and vehicles are tattooed with color.
The most prominent structure on the multi-lot property is the five-story factory built in 1900. The Wolkoffs carved the bulk of it into 90 artist studios called the Crane Street Studios; the warren of rooms includes sculptors, painters and other visual artists, some of whom have achieved a modicum of fame.
The rest of the building’s space, around 20 percent, consists of light manufacturing, mainly in the garment industry.
The Wolkoffs’ portfolio includes four other buildings in New York City, a small fraction of the family’s growing empire. Jerry, the patriarch, started as a floor waxer who eventually built over a thousand houses in Brooklyn and Staten Island. He moved his focus to Long Island and built the 400-acre Heartland Business Center in Edgewood and the 240-acre Heartland Executive Park in Hauppauge.
In 2001, he bought 460 acres of the former Pilgrim Psychiatric Center in Brentwood for $20 million. Plans for the property, now before the Town of Islip, call for a 9,000-unit development called Heartland Town Center.
Wolkoff is now waiting for the fortunes of Long Island City to change. For now, 5 Pointz will remain what he calls “the largest aerosol art building in the world,” but he is looking to leave a legacy for his grandchildren.
David Wolkoff said that the neighborhood shows promise, but has yet to reach what he termed “critical mass,” or “bodies on the streets.” Standing on the roof of 5 Pointz, which offers a 360-degree view that includes a sideways glance at the Manhattan skyline, he pointed toward proposed development sites nearby, envisioning his project’s place among them.
“There’s been a big difference in the last five years,” he said, nodding toward Queens West along the East River, the recently completed Citicorp 2 office complex and Arris Lofts. “Is it downtown Brooklyn? No. But it will come.”
The lot is zoned for manufacturing, office and residential use, said Jerry Wolkoff. Depending on how the project is assembled, the property could easily accommodate a 1.2 million-square-foot high-rise.
A buildable square foot is worth from $150 to $200 in the area, said David, whose maternal grandfather, Jack Entratter, owned the famous Sands Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas in the 1950s during the reign of the Rat Pack. Wolkoff the younger married a woman who also has an interesting pedigree: Stephanie Winston, granddaughter of famed jeweler Harry Winston.
The next incarnation of 5 Pointz may include an artistic component — studios, perhaps, or a gallery.
“We have options and we’re keeping our eyes open, but we’re enjoying the way it is now,” Wolkoff said. “We’re not looking to squeeze every dollar out of it; we get a kick out of this.”