Ellen Harvey produces installations, illuminated engravings, paintings, and public projects that apply a critical lens to traditional forms of artmaking, art exhibitions, and art viewership. For her New York Beautification Project (1999-2001), the British-born, Brooklyn-based artist “tagged” over the city’s graffiti with small-scale, oil paintings of landscapes, working in the “utterly uncool and unthreatening” style of the Hudson River School painters. The project, which asks viewers to consider the difference between graffiti and public art is embedded with irony—especially because Harvey, whose images could be considered acts of vandalism, is also trained as an attorney.