Who Creates the Light Post Mosaics in the East Village?

25 years ago, Jim Powers started creating The Mosaic Trail, a collection of light post mosaics honoring the history and relevance of the East Village. Since then, he’s mosaic’d 80 different light posts throughout the neighborhood. Etsy recently created a great documentary-style short about Jim and his work, including awesome archived footage of the Village in the 1980s and 90s.

In it, Jim talks about Giuliani’s ”clean-up” program in which 50 of his light posts were taken down and destroyed. Jim, who’s been homeless for nearly as long as he’s been creating the mosaics humbly says, “I have a responsibility to fix this up for the people that love this work.”