Isaiah Zagar: South Street Renaissance, a history of Philadelphia's Magic Gardens A visual representation of something that happened here
There are a few places created by an artists, craftsman, and architects through out the world that are preserved and protected because of their unique qualities as examples of an endeavor that we can not define but intuitively understand as representing a moment in time that transcends that time and is somehow exemplary of it. The Magic Garden's of Philadelphia grew out of a unique set of circumstances - in the late 1960's a group of young artists and entrepreneurs began renting derelict storefronts and apartments above the stores.
The South street corridor was slated by the Pennsylvania state government and the Philadelphia city administration to be torn down to make way for an expressway to link I-95 and I-76, Also making a mote between center city Philadelphia and South Philadelphia. Among the artists/ crafts people to move into the area were Julia and Isaiah Zagar, recently returned from three years of Peace Corps experience in Peru. They rented 402 South Street and opened a business, The Eye's Gallery.
Eye's began with the empting of suitcases filled with the exotic textiles, woodcarvings, and ceramics the Zagar's had collected for the three years in Peru and Bolivia. The physical decorating of the Gallery was accomplished by transforming the space with the detritus of South Street corridor from abandoned warehouses, especially a glass warehouse. Isaiah began a mosaicing marathon which was to carry him from the store up the stairs to their apartment and out the door to the adjacent buildings and finally through out the neighborhood.
The Theater of the Living Arts was half a block east of the Eye's. Andre Gregory, with avant-garde dramatic productions, was exciting the theater going public. To the west of Eye's on 5th Street was the newly formed Fight the Cross-town Expressway offices. Alice Lipscomb said to Isaiah Zagar, "A long haired hippy, yes, you too can help." More and more stores opened featuring crafts made on the street and brought by travelers of the world coming home to begin domestic lives on the edge of prosperous neighborhoods all over the country.
Click and drag on the image below to look around
Cities were in disarray. Philadelphia was in chaos. America was at war with itself and at war in Southeast Asia. In our little corner on our street we were fighting for our moment here, for our families, our community, our ideals of beautiful life, spiritual, cultural, and healthy. We formed a food co-op. A new director of The Theater of the Living Arts came after Andre Gregory, Tom Bissinger, an up and coming New York director. He opened a corollary theater to do experimental theater in an alley near the T.L.A. After two performances it was closed for city code violations. Tom saw the vitality of the artists and craftspeople here. He realized that the street was a theater that the "new urban pioneers," as he called us, was "where it was at" so he bought a building and began doing what we were doing, knocking down and building up, renovating. He opened a free store. He rented another space for performance. He wrote a play about urban change, "Abies Last Stand." The South Street Renaissance was an acronym that was becoming a reality. The Crooked Mirror Coffee Shop, the Gazoo, Yas Restaurant, and a Linchpin. The Works Craft Gallery (Rick and Ruth Snyderman, the couple that was to educate Philadelphia about the growth of fine American crafts) moved into one of the many abandoned clothing establishments, 319 South Street. And the fight against the South Street expressway was in full swing. The Painted Bride Art Center at, 527 South Street, was a venue for painters, dancers, and musicians. Gerry Givnish, at its helm, was learning how to write grants and was interested in establishing a business/ foundation in this amazing cultural outpost. Before long it had outgrown its small storefront theater and they began the search for larger accommodations. They found them in abandoned elevator factory in Old City, Philadelphia, 230 Vine Street, thus began the Old City revitalization.
Oh! By the way, the Vietnam War was over and so was the Cross-town expressway. We had kept our homes and our businesses alive, but prosperity was to quickly dissolve the community. Real Estate values climbed, investors saw clearly what we were blind too. The corridor of culture became an economic cow with a legend of creativity, youth and freedom. Through all the changes, Isaiah and Julia kept their focus. For Julia's part, educating Philadelphians to the beauty of Folk Art from everywhere in the world and Isaiah kept making art in many media, but foremost, he covered the walls in the corridor and the immediate neighborhood with mosaic shard murals.
A decisive moment came in 1991 when he began the embellishment of the Painted Bride Art Center, finishing all five walls (the skin of Bride). By this time, The Works Gallery had moved to Old City and there were not many of the original South Streeters left. Isaiah continued to mosaic as many buildings and walls that were available to him, mostly self-financed, as of today, seventy plus mosaic murals in the South Street corridor.
He and Julia by the time of the new century, Two Thousand, were still on South Street. The Eye's Gallery at 402 South Street and Isaiah's studio complex of buildings between 10th and 11th Streets and between South and Kater Streets. He was also working on a sculpture garden, but always tentatively, because he didn't own the adjacent lots that were next to his studio, The Magic Garden of Philadelphia's Magic Gardens.
In 2005 the investor/ owner of the lots 1022-1024, upon which The Magic Garden stood, decided it was time to cash in and put a price of $300,000 on the property and told Isaiah in no uncertain terms to get off the property. The Sculptural fence and all within would have to be demolished at his expense. Thus began the saga that would unfold into Philadelphia's Magic Gardens with the amazing continuing pro-bono help of the prestigious law firm of Ballard, Sparr, Ingersol, and Andrews. Thanks to Jamie Bishoff's amazing skills and hard work, there was an injunction to stop the owner from bulldozing the property in the middle of the night! Enter Dick Goldberg crafting a real estate deal with the crazy irate absentee owner and the team of lawyers who wrote up and saw the articles of nonprofit corporation through the U.S. government hurdles. Thus preparing for a permanent entity, a garden studio complex that will be open to the public.
The Magic Garden complex is the gateway to a moment in Philadelphia's history, The South Street Renaissance, and the work of a unique artist whose odyssey it was and is to live and work in Philadelphia on South Street.
There are a few places created by an artists, craftsman, and architects through out the world that are preserved and protected because of their unique qualities as examples of an endeavor that we can not define but intuitively understand as representing a moment in time that transcends that time and is somehow exemplary of it. The Magic Garden's of Philadelphia grew out of a unique set of circumstances - in the late 1960's a group of young artists and entrepreneurs began renting derelict storefronts and apartments above the stores.
A decisive moment came in 1991 when he began the embellishment of the Painted Bride Art Center, finishing all five walls (the skin of Bride). By this time, The Works Gallery had moved to Old City and there were not many of the original South Streeters left. Isaiah continued to mosaic as many buildings and walls that were available to him, mostly self-financed, as of today, seventy plus mosaic murals in the South Street corridor.