Nitin Mukul: hyper- local art & community action
Nitin, a 2024 Street Work Earth participant, is a painter and co-founder of Epi-center NYC, a Queens-based media platform that launched in the spring of 2020, the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. (Learn more about Nitin’s co-founder and life partner, S. Mitra Kalita, on MJN’s podcast, Into the Record!)
Epi-center was created as a response to the tragedy unfolding in Corona, Jackson Heights, and Elmhurst, the earliest and hardest hit areas in New York at the start of the pandemic — dubbed the epicenter. Several MJN team members call the area home and emerged from the experience physically, emotionally, and financially scarred.
Jackson Heights was among the many neighborhoods across New York that developed diverse forms of mutual aid when government was absent and isolation caused harm. Epi-center NYC started as a newsletter meant to connect neighbors and offer a pandemic resources. Today, it's a multimedia platform dedicated to sharing community stories and featuring local artists. It was also the key outreach platform, including booking thousands of vaccine appointments.
Heat maps
Nitin’s latest series, Heat Maps: Queens, are durational painting video works based in improvisational artworks made by layering paint in sheets of ice, freezing each layer so it accumulates color and texture, and then watching it melt according to natural weather conditions while it’s filmed. They seek to raise awareness about how and why certain areas of Queens — including East Elmhurst, Corona, Jamaica, Hollis, and Richmond Hill — are rated as high risk on the Heat Vulnerability Index (HVI), a map showing which neighborhoods have residents with higher risk of dying during and after extreme heat.
HVI incorporates social factors that contribute to risk, including surface temperatures, and access to green space and air conditioning. Differences in these risk factors across neighborhoods are rooted in past and present racism.
Disaster Preparedness Resources
Disasters can happen anytime, anywhere. Create a plan for you, your loved ones, and your community. Check out these resources to learn more, and let us know if you have ideas for other resources we should share.
