Usually, a New York City vacant storefront has nothing to offer passersby but the dead and empty husk of what once was an alive and vibrant business.
The nonprofit Art on the Ave, however, has taken over some of that barren window space to transform it into elaborate art exhibits for New Yorkers to enjoy.
Barbara Anderson, the founder of Art on the Ave, came up with the idea during the COVID-19 pandemic while jogging through the Upper West Side and taking note of all of the closed-down businesses coupled with all of the struggling street artists coping with societal shutdown.
Art on the Ave rolls out pieces for the general public to see for a select amount of time, usually three months, allowing for different crops of local artists to demonstrate their work to anyone who walks by.
Five years later, the organization’s latest exhibition has now taken root at the Alfred E. Smith Houses along St. James Place on the Lower East Side. The effort is part of a broader project in collaboration with the nearby New York Presbyterian Hospital.
Titled “Here, Now, Always: Everybody’s Neighborhood,” the exhibit is the nonprofit’s first foray into a space located at a New York City Housing Authority complex. It will also include art at two other nearby locations.
”We’ve continued in that vein of bringing art to communities where there are loads of artists living because we all know that artists can no longer afford to live in the areas traditionally known to be the artist enclaves of New York City,” said Anderson.
She told THE CITY she hopes this can be the first of many collaborations with NYCHA to beautify areas surrounding public housing in the city, and officials have expressed interest in continuing their relationship with Art on the Ave, though there are not yet concrete plans for an expansion.
Art on the Ave founder Barbara Anderson, Aug. 6, 2025. Credit: Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY
For every exhibition, Anderson cleans up the sidewalk and all of the space she intends to use inside the vacant lot while also repainting the gates and areas around the property. She even painted the borders of the deli that’s open and operating in between the empty retail spots that will be used for the art exhibits. She regularly makes trips to the three locations to clean up litter and trash that accumulates.
“Instead of having graffiti and the glass looking ugly, we thought it would be nice to have residents’ art hanging so people can enjoy it and we can have a beautiful view,” said president of the Smith Houses residents association, Aixa Torres. “Things like this just make life a little bit brighter.”
Feeling Beautiful
Anderson also has various programming scheduled at the complex including a painting event on Saturday, Aug. 16, organized with the Raising Haven Community Garden, located in the Smith Houses, and an art walk tour with older residents planned for next week.
Two of the artists on display at the NYCHA space — where a laundromat, doctor’s office and Checkers fast food restaurant used to be — currently live at the Smith Houses: Ivy Shields, 26, a photographer, and Peter Passuntino, 89, a painter. Shields’ series of photographs in the installation was actually taken last year on the same street where the Smith Houses exhibition now lies.
“We strive very hard to have as many hyper-local artists as we can,” said Anderson. “It makes such a difference to people walking by to see art that they can relate to.”
The latest exhibit is meant to reflect each of the artists’ perspectives, homes and cultures as well as present work from local talent in the area, from painters to photographers to textile artists.
Ivy Shields points to her art work displayed outside the Smith Houses, Aug. 6, 2025. Credit: Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY
“I just want all NYCHA housing kids to really be inspired and I don’t want them to ever feel like they aren’t as beautiful as they are just because they’re coming from somewhere that’s not desirable,” said Shields.
Art on the Ave has allowed Shields, who is a freelance photographer, to meet and interact with even more artists in her community and around the city, opening up doors for other creative opportunities in the process.
Passuntino, an on-and-off city resident since 1965, moved back to Manhattan last year after living in France for five years. He quickly realized life wasn’t much cheaper stateside.
“SoHo’s not like it used to be,” said Passuntino looking back on his life in the chic neighborhood where he lived for three decades. “Now people go there to buy a handbag or pair of shoes. There were hundreds of [art] galleries in SoHo but now there may be only 10 or 20.”
Passuntino has been living at the Smith Houses since last year and is still relatively new to the community. Through Art on the Ave, he has grown much closer with his fellow neighbors since being recruited by Anderson through his current roommate to be a part of the Everybody’s Neighborhood exhibit.
“I know a lot of people here now,” said Passuntino. “I told them, ‘Go to the St. James Place and look at the gallery because it’s going to be another SoHo.’”
Warm Hues
Before founding Art on the Ave, Anderson spent 30 years as a middle school and high school educator around the globe. Her warm demeanor draws in the people involved with the arts project.
On a tour she gave THE CITY of one of the creative space residencies offered through the organization, one artist referred to her as “the Beautiful Barbara,” while another greeted her with a suffocating bear hug while Anderson wanted to hear about his vacation to Italy.
“More of this needs to happen in vacant storefronts across the city,” said B.J. Jones, executive director of the “New” New York Panel, an initiative of the Mayor’s Office of Policy & Planning, which has helped Anderson find spaces. “They’ve activated the space and created a community in the process too.”
And the program has even drawn struggling artists out of dire situations.
When Naderson St. Pierre moved to New York City in 2022 without family or friends, and painted on the subway for almost half a year.
Artist Peter Passuntino, 89, looking through stacks of his most recent work. August 11, 2025. Credit: Alex Krales/THE CITY
“There were days when I didn’t have money for hotel rooms, so I slept on the J train,” said St. Pierre, who is originally from Haiti. “A lot of artists just need a space to create. That’s all I needed, and Barbara provided that space for me.”
He eventually found housing and slept, ate and painted in a small room in Brooklyn, hoping to find exposure and live comfortably.
When St. Pierre crossed paths with Art on the Ave, his life completely transformed. After receiving a spot at an Art on the Ave exhibition in Fulton Center, he soon earned a residency at one of the creative spaces offered by Anderson which exposed him to collectors, prospective buyers and new opportunities in different parts of the world.
He now lives in a new apartment in Brooklyn and makes art in a new studio space in Midtown Manhattan operated by Art on the Ave, after completing art residencies in Amsterdam and France — including designing a piano for the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.
Overall, artists have made over $415,000 in sales through their participation with Art on the Ave since it began in 2020, according to Anderson.
Anderson stated the mission of Art on the Ave was to take elements of life which usually don’t mix and bring them together in the hopes of fostering community cohesion and engagement with the artistic talent inside the neighborhood.
“The fact that people look in the window and they’re just standing there watching and glancing around at the work on display, that makes me so happy,” she said.
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