Isaiah Zagar

We had no idea upon visiting the South Street area of Philadelphia what an enormous treat we were in for. We expected to see some murals………wellllll……..

Words and pictures really cannot do it justice. It is something that must be seen and experienced.

The artist, Isaiah Zagar, is the true master who lives his art! He and his lovely wife, Julia, are both artists and urban pioneers who moved to a run down area of Philadelphia back in 1968.

We took almost 150 photographs and

still found it difficult to capture the brilliant texture, sparkle, interest, depth, charm and heart of it all.

Loving mixed media and always on the look out to rescue found objects, we felt SO ‘at home’ in Isaiah’s creations.

He uses lots of found objects in his artwork….broken tiles, mirrors, dishes, bottles, bicycle wheels, bits of this and that….Isaiah says he doesn’t know ‘why’ he makes the murals, just that he must!

My husband and I were blissfully wandering the South Street area on a glorious Spring day. We began at 4th Street, which is as far as our horse drawn carriage could take us.

Thanks to the kindness of a stranger, a lady taking in her recycling bin, we found out about THE MAGIC GARDEN.

She saw us snapping pictures left and right and just casually asked if we knew about it.

I’d like to give her a BIG hug. You’ll see why………….in my next post

“Each generation has its chance to modify a city to its needs and dreams. It’s called gentrification, but really it’s people re-thinking and re-dreaming a city.” ~Isaiah Zagar