A Portrait of Crown Heights: Cuomo’s Portrait Artist gives free portraits to Crown Heights for 1 yr

rusty_zimmerman2015

Portrait Artist to Governor Andrew Cuomo, Rusty Zimmerman, is painting a portrait of a place through its people by giving FREE portraits to residents of Crown Heights, Brooklyn for one year.  Zimmerman will paint 200 residents from June 2015 through May 2016, working with local galleries to display the work as it emerges, show the entire collection in 2016, and give the paintings to their subjects at no cost.  

This community arts initiative will be crowd-funded with a Kickstarter campaign, launching on April 17th, with a goal of $48,000 to fund the work for an entire year.   Zimmerman is working with elected officials, Community Boards and neighborhood associations to maximize outreach and community involvement.

About The Free Portrait Project

The Free Portrait Project: Crown Heights creates a portrait of a place through its people.  Giving 200 portraits to residents of Crown Heights, Brooklyn in one year, Zimmerman renders a physical snapshot of the neighborhood as it cycles through gentrification.  In doing so, Zimmerman explores the commonality of seemingly disparate communities within one neighborhood, crafts a time capsule amid rapidly shifting demographics, promotes community engagement and up-ends the tradition of portraiture being reserved for the wealthy few by giving these paintings to their subjects at no cost.

About Rusty Zimmerman

Rusty Zimmerman is the portrait artist and campaign poster designer to Governor Andrew Cuomo.  He has lectured at Wellesley College and will be guest-lecturing at Harvard University in the Fall.  Zimmerman has lived and worked in Crown Heights for 5+ years and calls it home.

Contact

To learn more about The Free Portrait Project: Crown Heights, please contact:

tel: 510-541-2501, [email protected], www.rustyzimmerman.com

www.facebook.com/freeportraitprojectcrownheights

whynot_31

Anyone that can make Cuomo look good must have serious talent.

StevenZimmerman

that's my nephew, and i'm damn proud of him

whynot_31

His outreach now involves a video:

goldemi1

The video is quite cool, and he's doing great work capturing the patchwork quilt of this neighborhood.  I'll send my 3.5 yr old daughter over...maybe CH's only pale redhead spanish speaking argentinian/american jew (and frequenter of nostrand icecream joints and hair salons....because she just loved going in random places to say hi to people)!