The Metropolitan Transportation Authority said “Beat It” to a second proposal to honor Michael Jackson in the Hoyt-Schermerhorn station, where the late King of Pop filmed the music video “Bad” in 1987.
Councilwoman Letitia James (D–Clinton Hill) asked the MTA to give her one more chance to commemorate Jackson who died in June. She wanted the MTA to commission a work of art, such as a mural, commemorating the legendary video, directed by Martin Scorsese, on the platform and mezzanine of A-, C-, and G-train station.
But the transit authority said James’s idea is off-the-wall, because it only installs public art during major station renovations and there’s no work scheduled for the Downtown station in the current capital budget, which lasts through 2014. A spokesman also said its public art panel never mandates the subject matter of a work, so it would not be able to stipulate that artists create a Jacko-themed creation.
Last week, James wanted to be starting something when she advocated for renaming the station in Jacko’s honor, or, at least, mount a plaque there acknowledging allegedly the greatest choreographed gang fight since “West Side Story.”