Comments on: On Hot Gay Statues: Sadly, Murray Hill Not Exactly Thriving

By: The Gay Recluse

The Gay Recluse — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 19:24:34 +0000

Thanks for writing, DoIM! I personally don’t have anything against the sculpure per se–I find pleasantly abstract– but I do find the context kind of arbitrary and corporate, which I’m guessing is what the submitter meant by “hideous.” (Also, the building behind it? Yuck.) What would be great would be to see your father’s sculpture interposed with the building: that would be a true statement for peace!

By: daughter of Irving Marantz

daughter of Irving Marantz — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 19:16:18 +0000

thank you for the attractive photo of my father’s work. Though I do not agree with the comment “hideous’ at all. It is in fact an abstract human figure. It is indeed not particularly gay or not gay rather it is simply human figure and a call for peace.

By: The Gay Recluse

The Gay Recluse — Wed, 28 May 2008 15:06:56 +0000

Thanks, C. I’ve heard similar stories about Park Slope and the UWS. It’s good to remember what makes neighborhoods great, and why so many of them now feel so soulless.

By: c

Wed, 28 May 2008 04:44:04 +0000

I lived in the building with the “gay” eagles, once upon a time. When I arrived, Murray Hill was, despite a lack of representative statuary, a bastion of gayness. There were six (count ‘em) gay bars: Uncle Charlie’s; Dakota; North Dakota; Styx; Uncle Charlie’s South, and Company. And, a Greetings (super gay) card store. By the apogee of the AIDS crisis, 1985, when Rock Hudson’s death from AIDS made the papers, every single establishment was gone, and Murray Hill was on its way to bourgeois, straight yuppiedom (and the numerous, high rise towers which always follow). It has yet to recover.