The New York Earth Room

The New York Earth Room is an art installation in Soho I’ve heard about, but never gone to. Here’s the overview from the website:

An interior earth sculpture.
250 cubic yards of earth (197 cubic meters)
3,600 square feet of floor space (335 square meters)
22 inch depth of material (56 centimeters)
Total weight of sculpture: 280,000 lbs. (127,300 kilos)

So to sum it all up, it’s a giant room of dirt that’s been sitting there since 1980. Intrigued? I know I am, let’s go and get a little dirty. Oh and it says that photography is not allowed, I’m hoping I can persuade them to take at least one shot to document it here at TWM. Otherwise I might have to do some improvising!

Goddamn it's bright out today. I think before we hit the Earth Room, I'm going to look for a pair of sunglasses.

Okay, thought the magic of the internet, you're spared kind of an uneventful subway ride to Prince Street. I like the little figures they've got on the walls in the station here.

I don't know how long they've been here, but they're pretty cool. This one makes me think of that son of a shit eater, Gruber MacDougal.

Memories...holy shitballs, it's bright out here. Let's go find some sunglasses.

There's always tables of things for sale on the sidewalk in this part of town, let's go take a look.

Here's a table of fashion books.

Fab gear...yeah, yeah, yeah.

I took a shot of this table of art and a fat guy leaning against the building started screaming at me saying I couldn't take a picture of it. If he would've been nice, I would've deleted the picture and just moved on, but I told him if his table is on the sidewalk, I have every right to take a picture of it, since it's out in public. He told me it was private property, so I countered that it was private property on a public sidewalk. After a few more minutes of arguing, I just left, some people just don't get it.

Here's a table of tiny, colorful t-shirts.

And bingo bango, a table of sunglasses!

Here's an obligatory sidewalk table mirror shot of me in the shades. They were only five bucks. ZZ Top flashback!

Okay, on to the Earth Room. It's right down the street here on Wooster.

Here's the building, 141 Wooster.

And there's the Earth Room in red. Let's buzz the buzzer and check this out.

Okay, we're inside, here's the foyer of the building.

Right this way...

Through the metal door and...

And up the steep flight of stairs and we'll be there.

Once I was up the stairs, I met Bill Dilworth, who is the keeper of the Dirt Room. He waters and tills the dirt and answers questions that people coming here have about the installation. He's a real nice guy and explained that they don't allow photography because they would rather have people experience it in real life and time. I was going to try to sneak a picture (you can find plenty online) but he was so nice about it, I decided not to break the rules. Bill has worked here for over twenty years now and below is an informative, short film featuring Bill explaining his job and The New York Earth Room.

As you saw in the film, Bill keeps a count of visitors by making a mark of the person. Here's today's page and Bill is pointing to my mark. It does kind of look like me! Bill told me one of the aspects of his job he likes is hearing and noting people's different reactions to the room. Personally, I have to say that standing there and staring at a huge room filled with black dirt kind of made me feel calm. And it was really unusual smelling dirt in New York. I recommend checking this place out if you're in New York or planning a visit. It's free of charge and a totally unique thing to do and experience.

Here's a photo of the Earth Room off of their website, I figured it would be okay to put this up to give you a little feeling of the space. But you really need to experience it in person, this doesn't do it justice.

On my way home I walked past the Morrison Gallery which is a rock 'n' roll gallery filled with interesting photos. I asked if I could take some pictures and was told no. I'm not having much luck on the photo front today!

And now, even the folks on the subway wall have turned their backs on me. Time to call it a day, I guess. See you tomorrow!

The New York Earth Room
141 Wooster Street (between Prince and Houston St.)

Further reading: Lonely Planet, Sense and the City and NY Times.

Ooh, I been dirt,
And I don't care.

Surprise link, click on it...I dare you!