{"id":7407,"date":"2025-05-22T18:12:29","date_gmt":"2025-05-22T18:12:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nationalgunowner.org\/index.php\/2025\/05\/22\/some-artists-are-losing-their-medium-as-mta-eliminates-the-metrocard\/"},"modified":"2025-05-22T18:12:32","modified_gmt":"2025-05-22T18:12:32","slug":"some-artists-are-losing-their-medium-as-mta-eliminates-the-metrocard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nationalgunowner.org\/index.php\/2025\/05\/22\/some-artists-are-losing-their-medium-as-mta-eliminates-the-metrocard\/","title":{"rendered":"Some Artists Are Losing Their Medium as MTA Eliminates the MetroCard"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Juan Carlos Pinto holds a MetroCard portrait of Nina Simone. Photo by Jamie Lubetkin<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority\u2019s recent announcement that it will stop selling the iconic yellow MetroCards by Dec. 31 came as heartbreaking, though not unexpected, news to a small but passionate community of artists who use the credit-card-sized passes to create surprisingly engaging works of creativity. Giving new meaning to the term \u201cunderground art,\u201d MetroCard art has thrived in New York ever since the cards replaced metal tokens as the city\u2019s essential transportation appliance 32 years ago. Now, its days are numbered.<\/p>\n

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Brooklyn-based artist Juan Carlos Pinto<\/a> has been at the vanguard of MetroCard art for almost as long as New Yorkers have been swiping the cardboard passes. Leveraging skills he honed creating street mosaics, Pinto painstakingly carves the cards into tiny shreds, then applies them to canvas to create portraits of artists, politicians, entertainers, sports stars and others.<\/p>\n

On the wall in his Flatbush studio: Barack Obama<\/a>, Keith Haring<\/a>, Jean-Michel Basquiat<\/a>, Will Smith<\/a>, David Bowie<\/a>, Pel\u00e9, Tupac Shakur<\/a>, to name a few. There are also birds, landscapes and artworks, including da Vinci\u2019s Mona Lisa<\/i> and Vermeer\u2019s Girl with a Pearl Earring<\/i>.<\/p>\n

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Pinto chose the MetroCard as his medium. Photo by Jamie Lubetkin<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cI have a little stash, about 10,000 cards,\u201d Pinto says wistfully, contemplating the day when his cherished medium will be no more. At his current rate of production, about one piece per month, he figures he has enough to keep at it for another five years.<\/p>\n

Pinto has lived in Flatbush for over 25 years in a home he purchased with proceeds from his artwork. \u201cThe garbage of New York City paid my mortgage,\u201d he said, remembering the years he spent scooping up discarded cards from the floors in subway stations.<\/p>\n

Another long-time collector of discarded MetroCards is East Village artist Thomas McKean<\/a>, who has been crafting intricate mosaics and three-dimensional constructions from the transit refuse for more than 20 years. Like Pinto, McKean\u2019s process involves meticulous cutting, sorting and reconfiguration to transform the cards into complex visual compositions.<\/p>\n

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Artist Thomas McKean reflects on the end of the MetroCard era in New York during an interview in his East Village apartment. Photo by Lisa Freeman<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cOne day, I forgot my newspaper, and I saw a poster about the MetroCard, which was still kind of new, and I started wondering how many words I could make from the word MetroCard. When I got home, I cut up some MetroCards and began reassembling the,m and I was hooked. I branched out from there,\u201d McKean told Observer, describing his entry into the MetroCard art world.<\/p>\n

Since then, MetroCard art has overtaken every inch of his East Village apartment. There are renderings of monsters, animals, people, his ancestors, events from his life along with tiny 3D recreations of buildings and other structures. And of course, there are thousands of MetroCards in overflowing boxes and bags. Like Pinto, McKean figures he\u2019s husbanded away about five years\u2019 worth of materials.<\/p>\n

The palette afforded by MetroCards might seem limited\u2014predominantly yellow backgrounds and blue text, some highlights in gold and brown, with white and a black magnetic strip on the back\u2014yet artists have discovered remarkable versatility within these constraints. The age of the cards, exposure to light and various print runs all contribute to a much wider palette of colors: the ubiquitous yellow, for example, can present as anything from lemon chiffon to ochre.<\/p>\n

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One of McKean\u2019s 3D works. Photo by Lisa Freeman<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The MetroCard art scene extends beyond these individual practitioners. The \u201cSingle Fare\u201d gallery exhibition series, initiated in 2010, brought together hundreds of artists who created miniature masterpieces on the cards. These shows revealed an astonishing diversity of approaches: some artists completely transformed their cards with gesso or paint, while others exploited the cards\u2019 physical properties through techniques like contour-line carving or folding.<\/p>\n

Nina Boesch<\/a>, whose MetroCard mosaics reimagine iconic New York landmarks and symbols, has kept the art form alive through educational outreach. In June, the New York Transit Museum hosted one of her hands-on workshops<\/a> in which participants learn her creative process while creating their own MetroCard masterpieces\u2014a bittersweet celebration on the eve of the medium\u2019s retirement.<\/p>\n

For some New Yorkers, the disappearance of MetroCards represents more than just the loss of a medium\u2014it symbolizes New York\u2019s relentless march toward digitization<\/a> at the expense of tactile, analog experiences. These small rectangular cards were New Yorkers\u2019 constant companions, tagging along in pockets and purses while waiting to exercise their utilitarian purposes. That they would become democratized canvases that reflected the city\u2019s DIY ethos and streetwise ingenuity is hardly surprising.<\/p>\n

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SEE ALSO: U-Haul Gallery\u2019s Mobile Model Takes Art to the Streets <\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The irony isn\u2019t lost on these artists that their medium was itself a technological replacement for another New York transit icon\u2014the subway token\u2014which was phased out in 2003. That evolution in fare payment technology left cultural artifacts that artists continue to use today in the creation of jewelry and other keepsakes.<\/p>\n

While some MetroCard artists view the coming fare card obsolescence with resignation, others see opportunity in scarcity. As supplies dwindle, existing MetroCard artworks may appreciate in value since no more can be created. A collectors\u2019 market already exists for the more than 400 special edition MetroCards issued over the years, with particularly rare specimens fetching surprising sums online.<\/p>\n

For artists like Pinto and McKean, the challenge is whether to hoard their remaining supplies, racing against the MetroCard\u2019s extinction, or to embrace new materials and forms. Both said they plan to explore alternatives during the final years of the MetroCard run.<\/p>\n

As New York\u2019s subway system evolves toward a frictionless future, these artists preserve fragments of a tactile past\u2014each MetroCard masterpiece contributing to the preservation of an urban legacy, a marker in the history of an ever-transforming metropolis, maybe even a small rebellion against time\u2019s relentless tide.<\/p>\n

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