THE BUZZ: Arts and poetry at a subway station near you

With crowded platforms and delayed trains, your daily commute may seem like a nightmare. But the MTA’s Arts for Transit program is taking over area subway stations, with hopes to make your travels more pleasant.

Our customers tell us again and again that even a small investment in art and music underground makes a huge difference to them, said MTA Chairman Joseph J. Lhota. It can really improve the entire experience of riding the subway. And the beauty of this program—and of poetry and art in general—is that it can really transport you.

The Arts for Transit program paired up with the Poetry Society of America for their “Poetry In Motion” features. Different thought-provoking poems and poetry excerpts will be displayed in the prominent square poster wells at passenger’s eye level.

This year, the MTA also debuted permanent art installations in subway stations around the city. One of them is The Flora of Bensonhurst by Joan Linder, a laminated glass artwork at the 71st Street station on the D Line, which has not yet been unveiled. The artwork features six intricately drawn plants flowing in the direction of the train. The artist created the drawings based on the wild vegetation she discovered on the streets and lots surrounding the station.

Linder hopes these panels will act as windows to a lost history – a place that was once home to dozens of sprawling farms. The green images will hopefully offer passengers a juxtaposed view of the plant images versus the conditions of the area now.

As more poems are selected, Arts for Transit will pair them with the 230 art installations. The artwork and the poetry are not meant to necessarily interpret each other but to create a dialog, explained Sandra Bloodworth, director of MTA Arts for Transit and Urban Design. You may experience them individually or as one. Each stands in its own right, yet they can be viewed in tandem. The interpretation is up to the individual, so we don’t expect everyone will experience the art or the poetry or the two together in the same way. It will be left to a multitude of interpretations.

Another art installation is at the 86^th Street R line station, which features Amy Bennett’s “Heydays.” The glass mosaic mural is on the station’s mezzanine wall of the 86^th Street station and shows 3-D replicas of large homes that make up Bay Ridge, as well as the neighbors that live in them.

Bennett wanted to conjure up memories of the estates, hotels and rural summer homes that graced Bay Ridge a hundred years ago. But the trees, grass and blue sky surrounding the houses could be interpreted as from the past or present.

For a full list of art installations and for more details on Poetry in Motion, visit mta.info.