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Is it electrical cord? Christmas decorations? Trash? Or sculpture? Juxtapoz contributing photographer Sam Bassett has been shaking the streets near his home at NYC’s Chelsea Hotel, and getting very mixed reactions to his work.

“In the New York art world, it is hardly surprising that some young upstart artist is the talk of his neighborhood because of his public art project along 23rd Street, from Seventh to Eighth Avenue,” writes By Corey Kilgannon for The New York Times.

“And New York City being what it is, it’s no surprise that there is some guy who hates the whole thing and keeps ripping the project down — giving way to an interesting creation-destruction battle that might intrigue a roomful of art theorists, and give the rest of us a chuckle.

“For the past few months, Sam Bassett, 31, an artist who lives in the Hotel Chelsea on the block, has been stringing long strands of masking tape overhead high over the street, from the top of one streetlight pole to the next.

“Mr. Bassett began buying large rolls of tape from a local hardware store and, late at night with a ladder, climbing the streetlights and stretching a few strands diagonally across the street. He was delighted to find that the tape remained for weeks, sometimes months, withstanding wind, the authorities and utility workers.

“He calls them ‘tape sculptures,’ and they have grown more elaborate, zigzagging down the block. The bright lines draw the eye up and make for an interesting new linearity against the grids of building and window lines above.”

Read the entire article and watch a video of Sam Bassett putting up and speaking on his work from The New York Times here.