By Matt Chaban 1/05 10:51am

Planes Trains & Automobiles

Walder works the crowd. (MTR)

First Day in Hong Kong, Jay Walder Pats Himself on the Back for M.T.A Leadership

Tuesday was Jay Walder’s first day on the million-dollar job in Honk Kong, and while the focus was on fair hikes there in his first press conference, the former M.T.A chief did not hesitate to take a swipe at New York, where frustrations with the politics and finances of the system drove him away.

“New York, when I arrived there, was in a financial crisis,” Mr. Walder said. “The system simply did not have enough money to continue to operate. The assets were not being renewed. And the infrastructure was in terrible condition.”

“What I did,” Mr. Walder continued, “was to be able to right that financial basis and to be able to put the system back on firm financial footing.” Read More

By Tom Acitelli 7/22/11 8:54am

Surviving In

It looks pretty at night, at least.

Jay Walder in Hong Kong: If He Thought the Upper West Side Was Pricey…

Last year, The Observer reported that relatively new (he was nine months in) M.T.A. chief Jay Walder and his wife had bought on the Upper West Side near five subway lines. The couple paid $1.599 million for a condo with three bedrooms, a lot of natural light, a big master suite with double sinks, and a walk-in closet. It was the sort of apartment a New Yorker could settle into for the long haul.

Now, though, with Mr. Walder decamping for Hong Kong, what of it? We don’t know yet. But we do know that he might find $1.599 million a steal for a nice three-bedroom in his next city. Read More

By Julia Halperin 12/23/10 10:04pm

Weird Art

Damien Hirst’s New Art Even Creepier Than Usual

What’s creepier than a platinum, diamond-encrusted human skull? A platinum, diamond-encrusted infant skull, of course!

Shock-jock artist Damien Hirst is notorious for his 2007 sculpture “For the Love of God,” a human skull cast entirely of diamonds which he tried (unsuccessfully) to sell for £50 million.

Now, he’s at it again. Perhaps out Read More

By Gillian Reagan 2/05/07 12:00am

Art Scribe Opened Terrain; ‘He Was the Go-Between Guy’

Jonathan Napack, 39, an Asian art expert and former New York Observer columnist, died of pneumonia on Jan. 20 at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Hong Kong. He died in the country where he worked for over a decade to build connections between Asian art and the Western world.

A fixture in galleries, studios and collections, Read More

By Tom Scocca 10/09/06 12:00am

Martin Scorsese, Now a Great Hong Kong Director

Hollywood has been trying to get a handle on Hong Kong moviemaking for more than a decade now, ever since Americans figured out our action heroes were holding their guns wrong. Instead of the old straight-up-and-down—in one hand, like a cowboy, or in the two-fisted isosceles tactical grip of Miami Vice—there was someone like Chow Read More