Artist turns a missing NYC subway tile into living art with chia seeds. 2 days later, she gets a response from Zohran Mamdani’s team

New York City’s subways are known for their rushing crowds, crumbling walls, peeling paint, and missing tiles exposing decades of urban wear. Yet creativity and imagination can turn these decaying surfaces into works of art, only if one has the vision. South Korean-American artist Eujue belongs to this category. One day, while casually walking through the city's Delancey Street/Essex Street subway, she noticed a gaping hole in one of the tiles. So, she decided to give it a makeover, which has now yielded a response from NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

From missing tile to living art

In the video Eujue posted on Instagram, she urged a plea to Zohran Mamdani: Allowing artists to replace missing subway tiles with art. After that, the artist was seen installing a chia seed-covered tile into the blank space of the station wall.

Explaining her idea behind the project, Eujue, who is also a ceramicist and designer, revealed that she has long been fascinated by the idea of plants reclaiming spaces in a world beyond humans and computers. Her earlier experiments included growing chia seeds on ceramic vessels and cultivating mushrooms that appeared to burst through the surface of her handmade pieces.

Zohran Mamdani’s team responds

This time, she brought the same concept to the subway. Eujue created a ceramic ‘E’ tile by incorporating chia seeds into wet clay and carefully nurturing it until tiny green leaves began sprouting across the letter. The experiment led her to imagine a different purpose for missing subway tiles, turning neglected gaps into miniature canvases where artists could introduce their own work. A few weeks later, she returned to the Delancey Street/Essex Street station and installed her creation in the empty spot, transforming an otherwise damaged section of the subway wall into a small piece of living art.

What happened next, however, took the project far beyond a single subway station. Just two days later, on September 23, Eujue shared another video revealing that Zohran Mamdani’s team had responded to her social media post. She showed viewers a screenshot of an email from the mayor’s office expressing appreciation for her video, leaving the artist visibly surprised and excited by the unexpected response.

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From viral idea to official proposal

The overwhelming response online also opened the door for Eujue to formally present the idea to the administration. Following the public interest, she submitted the required intake form and put forward a proposal suggesting that artists could create replacements for missing station tiles. She also shared a screen recording of the submitted NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani new media intake form, alongside her formal ‘NYC Tile Watch: Pilot Program Proposal’.

What began as one artist filling a missing tile with a living ceramic creation had therefore evolved into a crowdsourced public-art concept seeking to turn neglected subway spaces into opportunities for artistic expression.