Signs
The anonymous artists of DC are who keep one foot in front of the other for Ariel Kitch on her morning walk to work. Here, she records their illustrations in photographs.
My walk to work each morning on 9th Street: Door locked behind me, headphones on, eyes wide from caffeine, waiting for the stoplights to turn green, and stepping over the cigarette butts and shards of glass in the cracks of the concrete. Staring into the shop windows, boarded up storefronts, scrawled messages on brick walls, the perfume of girls passing me, the exhaust of the bus, painted over graffiti. I haven’t touched the newspaper yet or found out the headlines for the day. And everywhere I look are signs, warm and cold, waiting for me and yet never intended for me at all.
Like this one. Who’s young at heart? You or me? Someone stood here once in this same spot, and some teenage emotion overcame them in a fit of tiny lettering. Were they afraid that no one would ever find out how they really felt? In a cold and institutional city like DC, signs emerge in strange places.
This is my favorite, which you can find right outside NPR. It reminds me of the San Francisco artist Margaret Kilgallen (born in D.C.) who’s work is partially inspired by the hand painted signs around her in the Mission neighborhood.
Sometimes there are doors.
Or something scrawled.
But everything’s free to the city.
Tags: all things considered, ariel kitch, DC
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