Inquirer.com – Zurich DR

Author: Morgan Ritter

  • Where to watch Fourth of July fireworks in Philly, the suburbs, South Jersey, and the Shore

    Where to watch Fourth of July fireworks in Philly, the suburbs, South Jersey, and the Shore

    This Fourth of July will be unlike any in recent memory. As the nation marks its 250th anniversary, Philadelphia and the surrounding region are packed with celebrations — and fireworks displays. From the city and suburbs to South Jersey and the Shore, there are dozens of opportunities to catch a show.

    Whether you’re staying in Philadelphia, heading to the suburbs, or spending the holiday down the Shore, here’s where to find Fourth of July fireworks across the region.

    Fireworks in Philadelphia

    Fireworks after the San Diego Padres and Philadelphia Phillies game at Citizens Bank Park on July 2, 2025.Elizabeth Robertson / Staff Photographer

    Fireworks in Bucks County

    Fireworks in Chester County

    Fireworks in Delaware County

    Fireworks in Montgomery County

    Fireworks in Allentown

    Fireworks in South Jersey

    A view of Atlantic City’s fireworks from the Marina. (Courtesy of the Casino Reinvestment Development Authority)

    Fireworks at the Jersey Shore

  • The only collaborative Keith Haring mural that still hangs in its original location is in Point Breeze. It could be your next home.

    The only collaborative Keith Haring mural that still hangs in its original location is in Point Breeze. It could be your next home.

    A Point Breeze rowhouse, now available for rent, offers residents a chance to live with a one-of-a-kind work of art — the only Keith Haring collaborative mural that is still intact and in its original location in the world.

    The three-bedroom home at 2147 Ellsworth St. is adorned with the acclaimed street and pop artist’s We the Youth . The mural, painted on the building’s facade, has stood on the corner of 22nd and Ellsworth Streets for almost 40 years.

    “Keith believed that art was for everyone and that art should be accessible, so to have this mural still at this location for nearly 40 years is historically and culturally significant,” said Jane Golden, founder and executive director of Mural Arts Philadelphia.

    The mural features an array of Haring’s trademark dancing figures filled with bright colors and patterns. It also has a small garden next to it, affectionately called “Haring Park,” which has been tended by neighborhood residents since the 1980s.

    Keith Haring, who died in 1990, with his painted carousel.

    Haring, who was born in Reading in 1958 and raised in Kutztown, drew the mural over a few days in September 1987, coinciding with the U.S. Constitution’s bicentennial. The title of the mural pays homage to the Constitution’s opening lines.

    Its location was important to Haring.

    He did not want the mural to be in a more upscale, trendy part of the city, one of the mural’s student collaborators, Rita Martello, told online art marketplace Artsy in 2022.

    “He wanted to put it in an actual urban neighborhood,” Martello said to Artsy.

    Invited by two nonprofits that worked with youth, CityKids NYC and Brandywine Workshop, Haring worked with 14 students. While some of the dancing figures are solid colored, others feature unique patterns and symbols, all contributed by the students.

    “Wherever [murals] are, they provide a foundation where change can begin,” said Golden. “They are a vehicle through which important stories are told, and they allow Philadelphia to maintain its status as a global leader in the arts and culture arena.”

    Presently about 1,000 murals are displayed on the sides of residential homes in Philadelphia through partnerships with Mural Arts.

    Erica Bryant mimics a figure from the Keith Haring mural on the Point Breeze house she and her husband own. It is the only mural Keith Haring made with community groups that is still intact.MICHAEL S. WIRTZ / Staff

    Haring, whose preferred medium was chalk, often created works that were not meant to be permanent. We the Youth too was not immune to decay over time.

    In 2013, after Erica and Lucas Bryant of St. Paul, Minn., bought the house, Mural Arts undertook a massive restoration of the piece, adding several layers of paint and a protective coating against the sun, entirely replacing damaged sections, and replacing the chain link fence.

    “Philly is very proud to have a Keith Haring mural and especially one embedded in the community that was done in such a collaborative manner,” said Golden.

    Haring, who started making chalk drawings in the New York subway, first wanted to paint We the Youth on a garbage truck but was refused by the Philadelphia Sanitation Department.

    He died in 1990, from AIDS-related complications at age 31.

    “You can be the only person in the world who lives in a Keith Haring art piece!” boasts the OCF Realty listing for the three-bedroom, 2 ½ bathroom apartment.

    The 1,797-square-foot, three-story rowhouse was renovated in 2020 and has a backyard patio and a roof deck. The property, managed by OCF Realty, rents for $3,295/month.

  • Artist Miguel Horn’s sculptures will adorn new Avenue of the Arts median

    Artist Miguel Horn’s sculptures will adorn new Avenue of the Arts median

    The Broad Street Avenue of the Arts makeover project, which broke ground in January, is inching its way to completion.

    The remaking of the median on South Broad Street in front of the Kimmel Center, part of the larger AveArts 2.0 project, will now include the installation of a pair of sculptures by artist Miguel Horn.

    The South Philly-based artist, who is behind several public sculptures in the city, including Center City’s ContraFuerte, sought approval for the sculptures’ concept review in a Philadelphia Art Commission meeting on Wednesday.

    The sculptures are scheduled to be installed this fall and remain in place for five years.

    Artist Miguel Horn at Tacony Creek Park, 1101 E. Cayuga St., in the Juniata Park section of Philadelphia on Tuesday, September 13, 2022.Alejandro A. Alvarez / Staff Photographer

    The Broad Street renovation project involves reconstructing the median into a raised planter, adding landscaping, restoring pavement, and installing pedestals and lighting for the public art. The median construction is scheduled to be completed this month, while Horn’s sculptures will be installed in the fall.

    A Philly artist created a giant sculpture of his father’s head that disappears with the tides. Imagine his father’s surprise.

    Made of bright yellow powder coated steel, Horn’s sculptures will display a blurred image of moving pedestrians. The concept for the design, Horn said, came from him making Light Detection and Ranging (lidar) scans of buildings around Philadelphia. He began to notice something interesting when people walked in front of the scanner.

    “This section of the Reading Terminal Market at Filbert Street was flooded with pedestrians walking by, and these movements of pedestrians across this space created this tapestry of figurative elements, abstraction, and I just fell in love,” Horn said at Wednesday’s meeting.

    A rendering shows the median on South Broad Street in front of the Kimmel Center, part of the larger AveArts 2.0 project, which will include sculptures by artist Miguel HornCourtesy of OJB & Miguel Horn

    He then proceeded to go through the scans and select different movements to create the final sculpture design of walking pedestrians.

    “This Muybridge-like study of movement for me was the most compelling thing sculpturally I’ve seen rendered on a computer screen in years,” he said, referring to the pioneering photographer best known for creating The Horse in Motion (1878).

    Horn’s design did raise some concerns among attendees on Wednesday, including potential sight line blockages for motorists.

    In the meeting, he assured that there was no concern for safety. His presentation to the Arts Commission claimed that the sculptures would still allow for a 215-foot sight line of incoming traffic on either side of the median.

    A rendering shows the median on South Broad Street in front of the Kimmel Center, part of the larger AveArts 2.0 project, which will include sculptures by artist Miguel HornCourtesy of OJB & Miguel Horn

    “There will not be an interruption to any visual sight lines,” he said.

    Design Advocacy Group (DAG) vice-chair David Brownlee, who did not attend Wednesday’s meeting, considers planting trees in the median impractical.

    “No one has ever said to me that the problem with Broad Street is there’s no shade in the middle of the street,” he said. “Or that’s the problem with Broad Street is you get out of the street and you look up and see that tower of City Hall.”

    Rather than placing trees and sculpture in the middle of the road, Brownlee suggested widening of sidewalks and installing art on each side so pedestrians can view them while walking.

    Horn’s concept review for the sculptures was approved by the Arts Commission, with a final review expected at a later date.

    A rendering shows the median on South Broad Street in front of the Kimmel Center, part of the larger AveArts 2.0 project, which will include sculptures by artist Miguel HornCourtesy of OJB & Miguel Horn

    The AveArts 2.0 project aims to beautify Avenue of the Arts into a cohesive streetscape. The plan is to renovate all 10 blocks between City Hall and Washington Avenue at a cost of $15 million per block.

    Funding for the project is expected to be a mix of public money, corporate and individual donations, and foundation support.

    “I find this to be a reclamation of our public space through this figurative artwork,” Horn said. “I’m constantly trying to find opportunities to bring the human experience to the forefront of these public spaces.”

    A previous version of the article misstated the median project’s timeline. It will be completed this month.

  • Amy Poehler was cursed out at PHL once and she told Colman Domingo all about it

    Amy Poehler was cursed out at PHL once and she told Colman Domingo all about it

    Amy Poehler had somewhat of a rude welcome when visiting Philadelphia.

    “The only time I’ve ever been called a c-word to my face [was] at the Philadelphia airport [with Tina Fey],” the Parks and Recreation actor said, laughing, on the latest episode of her podcast, Good Hang.

    Poehler’s crime? Saying no to an autograph flipper.

    “Tina turned to me and she goes, ‘Welcome to Philly,’” Poehler added, referring to her close friend, the Upper Darby native and collaborator on last year’s “Restless Leg” comedy tour.

    Her guest on the podcast, West Philly native Colman Domingo, seemed to empathize but also rose to the defense of his hometown.

    “[Philly’s] a city of underdogs. Tina and I, we always talk about that,” said Domingo, who stars in Netflix’s The Four Seasons, on which Fey is a showrunner. “We’re like, there’s something, that Philly in us.”

    Fey, who grew up taking trips to Wildwood, has the characters in Season 2 of The Four Seasons taking their summer vacation at the Jersey Shore, as a nod to her Philly roots. Domingo, who attended Temple University, also vacationed down the Shore, frequenting Margate and Cape May.

    Domingo also recalled several Philly-specific memories from his childhood on the podcast, claiming that his parents “used to always throw the best parties.”

    “We lived in a rowhome in Philadelphia, and [in] the basement, we had a bar down there,” he said, adding that dancing was a big part of those house parties.

    “We dance like, do you remember that show Dancin’ on Air? With Kelly Ripa? They don’t move like that anymore. We moved like we were trying to hurt somebody.”

    Tina Fey as Kate and Colman Domingo as Danny in Season 2 of the Netflix comedy series “The Four Seasons,” premiering May 28.Emily V. Aragones/Netflix

    And just in case Poehler needed more convincing that Philly is largely a decent and fun city, Domingo made sure to name-check another famous West Philadelphian: Will Smith.

    “He was actually very friendly, everybody really liked him,” said Domingo of his fellow Overbrook High School alum.

    Domingo, whose latest release is Steven Spielberg’s Disclosure Day, definitely has more convincing to do.

    “Philly makes Boston look like London, England,” said Poehler, referring to her Massachusetts hometown. “Philly is wild. [The Phillie Phanatic] is an insane person.”