STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. – For Cynthia Mailman, making a statement was a way of life.
As a feminist artist, she used her paint brush to question God’s gender and urge women to control their own bodies. As a longtime Stapleton resident and civic leader, she rallied against projects that threatened the historic integrity of her neighborhood. And true to her Jewish heritage, she spoke out boldly against antisemitism.
It didn’t matter if she raised a few eyebrows or turned a few heads along the way with her tough-love, no-nonsense style. That meant she was getting her message across.
Cynthia Mailman at one of her exhibits. (Photo courtesy Councilmember Kamillah Hanks)Third-Party-Submitted
Ms. Mailman’s death on Dec. 19 in Calvary Hospital, Brooklyn, inspired praise for her courage, charisma and conviction. She was just two weeks shy of her 83rd birthday and, by all accounts, a force of nature through her final days.
“Cynthia was bigger than life, with a powerful personality,” said Staten Island artist Diane Matyas. “She never left a room without making a statement.”
Councilmember Kamillah Hanks and artist Cynthia Mailman pose for a selfie at the Snug Harbor Cultural Center, Livingston.Third-Party-Submitted
“When Cynthia spoke, people listened,” said Kamillah Hanks, City Councilmember and a Stapleton neighbor who appreciated her mentorship. “If she believed in something, she’d go to the mat for it. She was a warrior.”
The Councilmember and the artist attend an exhibitThird-Party-Submitted
Hanks was one of dozens of friends Ms. Mailman reached out to as she battled pancreatic cancer under hospice care. Many of them gathered at her bedside over the last few weeks of her life.
“She was pleased to get visitors and the exchanges were loving,” said Rabbi Gerald Sussman of Temple Emanu-El, Port Richmond, where Ms. Mailman attended services and sang in the choir, and where her funeral was held on Dec. 28.
“She was overwhelmed and grateful for the support from her friends,” added his wife, Rebbetzin Bonita Sussman. “People were streaming in, day and night. It was one big love fest.”
Cynthia and Silver at home in Stapleton. (Photo courtesy Dr. Phil Rosen)Third-Party-Submitted
Yiddish roots
Born on New Year’s Eve in 1942 to Russian immigrants, Cynthia Mailman grew up in the Bronx with a younger sister, Pamela. Yiddish and English were spoken in their bilingual home.
By age 10, young Cynthia had completed her first oil painting and was traveling to Manhattan for classes at the Arts Students League of New York. She graduated from the former School of Industrial Arts, now the High School of Art and Design, and earned a bachelor’s degree in art and art education from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and later, an MFA at the Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University.
Cynthia Mailman discusses her painting, “God,” at a reception for her solo show, “Origins of God,” at Rowan University Art Gallery & Museum, Glassboro, N.J., in October 2023. (Photo by Kristin Qualls, courtesy of Rowan University Art Gallery & Museum)Third-Party-Submitted
She taught art in the New York City public school system, at the former Livingston College of Rutgers University and at Queensborough Community College of the City University of New York.
Ms. Mailman was always ready to speak up about the issues of the day. As an active supporter of the civil rights movement, she was front and center for the March on Washington in August 1963. The following year, she was in Flushing Meadows Corona Park to demand, “We don’t want a World’s Fair — We want a Fair World.”
Cynthia and Silver on the rooftop of their Brooklyn Heights apartment building, circa 1960s. (Photo courtesy Dr. Phil Rosen)Third-Party-Submitted
She met her future husband, Silver Sullivan, at Pratt, while he was pursuing a degree in industrial design. They were married in Brooklyn Borough Hall on July 30, 1965, with a backyard reception in Castleton Corners, and began a loving and colorful partnership that would span 60 years.
The couple lived in Brooklyn Heights and California before settling in Stapleton the 1970s. Ms. Mailman immersed herself in the vibrant bohemian arts scene of New York City, and began advocating for women artists who were struggling to make a name for themselves in male-dominated galleries.
Cynthia Mailman with her painting “God,” in April 2007. (Photo by Andrew D. Hottle, Rowan University)Third-Party-Submitted
The artist as feminist
In the spirit of feminist solidarity, Ms. Mailman joined a dozen women artists in 1978 for a collaborative installation titled, “The Sister Chapel,” a playful reference to the Sistine Chapel. Each woman was asked to present her concept of a female role model.
Simply titled “God,” Ms. Mailman’s towering acrylic on canvas at 9 feet tall imagined the deity as a nude woman. The figure’s waist-length, dark hair hinted it was a self-portrait, adding to its intrigue.
Cynthia Mailman talkede with a reporter about her life in Stapleton since 1971. (Staten Island Advance/ Jan Somma-Hammel) Jan Somma-Hammel
“A sister chapel should have a sister God,” Ms. Mailman declared during a panel discussion. “I thought about what God should look like; it took me a long time to come up with an actual concept of what she would be. I thought about how we are supposed to be in the image of God. And so I decided to use myself.”
God would not be ashamed of her body, Ms. Mailman insisted.
“It’s not just a nude,” she said in another interview. “There’s something about how in-your-face it is. She’s 9-feet-tall and when you stand in front of her, you’re sort of in front of a vagina.”
Ms. Mailman’s “God” continues to inspire at the Rowan University Art Gallery & Museum in Glassboro, N.J., where “The Sister Chapel” returned to public view in 2016 and is now part of the permanent collection.
Cynthia Mailman prepares a soup during the Mud Lane Society’s potluck soup supper held at Bob and Linda McAndrew’s home. The eating began after caroling throughout the neighborhood. (Photo by Bill Lyons/Staten Island Advance)Staten Island Advance
“This was a major statement by these artists about women,” said Andrew D. Hottle, art history professor and curator at Rowan who worked closely with Ms. Mailman. He praised her for “advocating for opportunities in the visual arts at a time when it was very difficult for women to get the recognition they deserved.”
Her final solo show, “The Origins of God,” was presented at Rowan in 2023 and at the Carter Burden Gallery, Manhattan, in 2024. That exhibit “circled back to her ongoing challenge of the God concept as inherently male,” Hottle explained.
Her last participation in a group show was in September, marking the 50th anniversary of SOHO20. Ms. Mailman was a founding member of the art gallery and cooperative established as a voice for women and marginalized artists.
In dozens of solo and group exhibitions, her work was shown at the Snug Harbor Cultural Center, the Staten Island Museum and the Carter Burden Gallery. It has been collected by the Akron Art Museum in Ohio, the New Jersey State Museum, the Everson Museum in Syracuse and the Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University.
Cynthia Mailman joined protesters at Silver Lake Park Road last April. (Photo courtesy Dr. Phil Rosen)Third-Party-Submitted
An honor, then a loss
Shortly after the Twin Towers opened in 1973, Ms. Mailman won a public art competition to paint a 54-foot-long mural ringing the walls of the World Trade Center PATH train terminal that she would call, “Commuter Landscape.”
She was awarded a $10,000 stipend from the competition, sponsored by the federally funded CETA Artists Project, and spent a year working on the mural in a windowless studio in the sub-basement of the World Trade Center.
Toiling nights, weekends and holidays, she interacted with maintenance workers, police officers, newspaper sellers and food vendors stationed around the World Trade Center. Port Authority officials often brought VIP guests to see her working on the project, according to an oral history produced by the 9/11 Memorial & Museum.
More than 100,000 commuters a day viewed the giant mural that used pastel shades to juxtapose technology and transportation with the natural environment. Highlighting the hulking infrastructure of the Pulaski Skyway, it was intended to uplift commuters passing through the gritty urban area.
On Feb. 26, 1993, Ms. Mailman was at home in Stapleton when she learned about the first bombing of the World Trade Center. “Commuter Landscape” had been attached to a wall abutting the parking garage where the bomb had exploded.
Cynthia Mailman is excited that she got to vote for three women in a recent election. (Staten Island Advance/Jan Somma-Hammel)Jan Somma-Hammel
Two days later, she and her husband traveled to the towers to confirm the mural’s fate.
“I wanted to find the teeniest scrap of the canvas,” she recounted in an interview. A police officer confirmed it had been “blown to smithereens,” and she acknowledged that the loss of human life was more significant.
It wasn’t the first time Ms. Mailman had to cope with the loss of her artwork. In January 1982, a fire in the Stapleton building where she stored her paintings destroyed nearly all of her early work covering a 15-year period.
“I’m so grateful that no one was hurt, that we saved what we managed to save,” she told a reporter a month later. “I go along for a few days, but then I have nightmares. I see images of the paintings that burned. I wake up and cry.”
She confided to a friend that losing her artwork was like losing a child.
Perhaps by divine intervention, the only painting to survive the fire was “God,” the 9-foot nude she had created for “The Sister Chapel” project.
Cynthia Mailman joined protesters at Silver Lake Park Road last April. (Photo courtesy Dr. Phil Rosen)Third-Party-Submitted
Community protector
Ms. Mailman was passionate about environmental issues impacting her North Shore neighborhood and Staten Island as a whole. Never reluctant to speak her mind loudly and publicly, she was a frequent participant at Community Board meetings and rallies.
As a founder and president of the Mud Lane Society for the Renaissance of Stapleton, she helped establish the St. Paul’s Historic District and galvanized community support against a sugar refinery, a coal slurry pipeline and a NASCAR raceway.
In 2013, she expressed concerns about a modern addition to the historic Stapleton library.
“We would just like to see the completed building have some continuity with what’s there, and not be an ugly, modern, glass box that’s going to look more like some midtown-Manhattan office building,” she told an Advance/SILive reporter.
Cynthia Mailman, at rear, surrounded by friends at a dinner party.Third-Party-Submitted
Last April, Ms. Mailman joined Transportation Alternatives to protest the reopening of Silver Lake Park Road after its closure during the COVID-19 pandemic. Sporting a red beret in a Facebook photo, she held up a sign declaring in bold letters, “No cars in our park!” and proudly reported, “We had a big crowd.”
In spite of the outcry, the roadway reopened to vehicular traffic on weekdays a month later.
Ms. Mailman could also be a project supporter. In the early 2000s, she favored a proposal to transform the shuttered Navy Homeport into a movie-making site called Stapleton Studios. The proposal ultimately failed to win city approval.
For the Mud Lane Society, she organized tours to showcase Victorian homes lining the streets of Stapleton.
The couple at the Jersey Shore, circa 2020. (Photo courtesy Dr. Phil Rosen)Third-Party-Submitted
“During the last quarter century and more, Cynthia was a fierce and respected advocate for Stapleton and Mud Lane,” said District Attorney Michael McMahon, a former City Council member. “As a civic leader, she helped us renovate Tappen Park and was a leading supporter in helping me landmark the Mud Lane Historic District. Her passionate outlook was seen in her strong opinions as she also stirred excitement and powerful emotions in everyone she met and everything she did and created.
“They sure don’t make them like Cynthia anymore,” the district attorney continued, “and her passing leaves a huge hole in the fabric of the arts and culture as well as the civic fabric of Staten Island.”
Loyal and good friend
When she wasn’t painting or protesting, Ms. Mailman was an avid birdwatcher who participated in the annual Christmas Bird Count on Staten Island.
At holiday house parties, she regaled guests with spirited caroling around the piano as they welcomed the New Year and celebrated her birthday.
“People who met her didn’t forget her,” said West Brighton artist Susan Grabel. “She was a loyal and good friend.”
“She was always well-dressed and put-together,” recalled Andrew Hottle, curator. “She was confident in her own world view, assertive but never overbearing. And she was a great storyteller.”
Staten Island artist Diane Matyas said Ms. Mailman and her husband worked well together, renovating neighborhood buildings and often renting them to artists, “their favorite tenants.”
Silver Sullivan and Cynthia Mailman enjoy a Tuesday morning skating session at Chelsea Piers in 1996. (Michael McWeeney/Staten Island Advance)advance
Recently, they took up ice skating and frequented the Chelsea Piers Sky Rink in Manhattan. “They had an unbreakable bond. As a couple, there was none like them,” she added.
They enjoyed snorkeling in the Caribbean reefs, and traveling through Central America and Europe. Italy and Mexico City were favorite destinations.
“We were Yin and Yang,” Silver Sullivan confirmed. “We were compatible in life, religion and politics. It was a symbiotic relationship, and we made everything click.”
Survivors and arrangements
Ms. Mailman’s survivors include her husband, Silver Sullivan; her brother-in-law, Dr. Philip Rosen, and a nephew, Julian Rosen. She was predeceased by her sister, Pamela Rosen, and her parents, Julius Mailman and Claire Russler Mailman.
A funeral service was held Dec. 28 in Menorah Chapels, New Springville. Burial was in Mount Hebron Cemetery, Queens.
Condolences
Janice Monger, president and CEO, Staten Island Museum: “We are deeply saddened about the passing of Staten Island artist and activist Cynthia Mailman. She was a longtime supporter of the museum with several pieces in the permanent collection and a history of being featured in exhibitions. Cynthia was honored by the museum at the 2009 gala. Three of her pieces were part of the museum’s inaugural exhibition at Snug Harbor, ‘Staten Island SEEN,’ in 2015, documenting the changing landscapes on the Island. More recently, Cynthia generously donated the Mud Lane Society’s papers to the museum archive in 2024, documenting her time as president of the organization, which served a critical role in the preservation movement on Staten Island. Our deepest condolences to her family and friends.”
Kamillah Hanks, City Councilmember and friend (via Facebook): “Cynthia was one of the proudest, fiercest and strongest women I’ve ever had the pleasure and privilege of knowing. Artist, activist, businesswoman and civic leader, Cynthia taught me what it was to truly fight for one’s community and rights. And she fought everyone about everything; the rights for women, artists, antisemitism and the historic preservation of communities and neighborhoods. I will miss our spirited conversations, I’ll miss her advice. My sincerest condolences to Silver Sullivan and her nephew, Julian; you all should find peace in knowing that Cynthia lived an incredible life, not one moment missed, not one space spared. Godspeed, my dear friend.”
Kenneth Mitchell, executive director, Staten Island Zoo: “With the passing of civic leader Cynthia Mailman, Staten Island has lost one of its most unflinchingly passionate fighters for the community. As North Shore Council member, I had worked closely with Cynthia on such projects as the renovation of the historic Stapleton Library. I respected her no-nonsense candid input. She made it clear her priority was looking out for the residents of Stapleton and beyond. Cynthia left a lasting positive impact, that’s for certain. We are grateful that she felt so deeply and worked so diligently for the good of the community.”
Staten Island artist Diane Matyas: “Cynthia Mailman was one of the first artists I met after I arrived on Staten Island in the fall of 1985. After months of work, I knew many artists and denizens of Stapleton, including the dealers at her favorite vintage shops. Cynthia introduced me to Elizabeth Egbert, with whom I became a partner in public art. Cynthia often advised me in those early days, ‘Choose fame over fortune, kid,’ when making an art career. I have always believed Cynthia Mailman to be invincible, and like her famous self-portrait as ‘God,’ a key part of ‘The Sister Chapel’ exhibition of that era, she will always stand tall, proud and powerful. She casts a long shadow as an artist and community member on Staten Island, and will be sorely missed.”