Get permission before loving New York


An artist and furniture maker was arrested for hanging up illuminated I heart New York signs in Brooklyn. I normally keep a pretty liberal view about street art, but in this case I'm on the side of the law, for two reasons:

1. People in New York are understandably jumpy about terrorism, and NYPD didn't go after Miyakawa until they got multiple calls about suspicious packages. "People should have known it was art" isn't really that strong an argument.

2. It's especially not a strong argument when the art in question is a plastic bag with a flashlight in it. That's kind of sloppy as art, public or otherwise.

I hope he doesn't do any jail time, don't get me wrong, but it's hard for me to see this one as an overactive or anti-art police story.

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