{"id":386590,"date":"2026-10-29T13:36:13","date_gmt":"2026-10-29T13:36:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/386590\/"},"modified":"2026-10-29T13:36:13","modified_gmt":"2026-10-29T13:36:13","slug":"legendary-graffiti-artists-mural-celebrates-arts-org","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/386590\/","title":{"rendered":"Legendary graffiti artist’s mural celebrates arts org"},"content":{"rendered":"

Folks passing by a wall on East Third Street and Avenue B in the East Village may not have realized that the guy on a ladder with a spray paint can and baseball hat is a world-renowned artist.<\/p>\n

Legendary graffiti and fine artist John Matos, known as CRASH, has been doing it since he was a 13-years-old in the Bronx in the 1970s. He is widely regarded as a street art pioneer.<\/p>\n

“What’s funny is a lot of people remember so much of the ’70s and early ’80s, and especially native New Yorkers, they’re super proud that this has gone so global,” he said. “And it’s kind of nice to be involved.”<\/p>\n

\"(Spectrum<\/p>\n

(Spectrum News NY1\/Roger Clark)<\/p>\n

In this case, the mural is a celebration of The Little Italy Street Art Project, or The LISA Project NYC, founded by Wayne Rada and husband Rey Rosa 14 years ago.<\/p>\n

The nonprofit organization has been dedicated to transforming urban spaces through art, partnering with artists, property owners, brands and community organizations.<\/p>\n

“One thing led to another, and we did some great murals that went viral, that gave the project some life,” Rada said. “And great companies saw us, and partnered with us, and from there we grew, and we became a fabric of the city.”<\/p>\n

\"(The<\/p>\n

(The LISA Project NYC)<\/p>\n

There are, and have been, large-scale murals throughout lower Manhattan and elsewhere, featuring all types of subjects, including musical acts like the Beastie Boys, Bad Brains and Blondie, and the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.<\/p>\n

Rada and Rosa say at the beginning, the concept wasn’t as accepted, but has come a long way since then.<\/p>\n

“The more we kept doing, the more people wanted, and we wanted to facilitate it, and we wanted to, you know, why not create a mural district for New York?” Rosa said. “We deserve it as much as everyone else does.”<\/p>\n

\"(The<\/p>\n

(The LISA Project NYC)<\/p>\n

It’s a neighborhood with an arts heritage, looking back on legends like Basquiat, Haring and Warhol. Rada says it was once the center of culture, and is still relevant and still matters.<\/p>\n

“We like to remind people why it’s cool downtown,” Rada said. “Lots of young, fresh faces, but they don’t really know the history, and who made it this way, so we try to remind people of that.”<\/p>\n

No need to remind CRASH of that. He’s been working with The LISA Project NYC since 2014.<\/p>\n

\"(The<\/p>\n

(The LISA Project NYC)<\/p>\n

“They support the arts, and then the artists also support them,” he said. “We’ve done projects in the past where we’ve done prints to help raise money for their projects. So it goes hand in hand.”<\/p>\n

Rada says there are some walls that turn over with multiple artists working on them over the years \u2014 and the more permanent murals, they hope, live forever.<\/p>\n

The new work from CRASH is not only a celebration of the The LISA Project NYC, but a tribute to local business owner Ellen Freedman, who passed away in April.<\/p>\n

It also pays tribute to another legendary graffiti writer, RIFF 170, who passed away this week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Folks passing by a wall on East Third Street and Avenue B in the East Village may not…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":386591,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[472,2296,25,4982,128,231,9,24,12,63,2297,129,131,130,27,200],"class_list":["post-386590","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-app-arts-entertainment","tag-app-human-interest","tag-app-top-stories","tag-arts","tag-bronx","tag-human-interest","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-news","tag-nyc","tag-roger-clark","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news","tag-top-stories","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386590","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=386590"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386590\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/386591"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=386590"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=386590"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=386590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}