The marble arch, the fountain plaza, chess tables under the trees, the works set on steel easels around the water.
The land was a potter's field from 1797 until 1825, and thousands are still buried under the lawn. It became a parade ground and then a park. Stanford White designed the marble arch, dedicated in 1895 to replace a wooden one built for the centennial of Washington's inauguration. In 1958 neighbors led by Shirley Hayes and Jane Jacobs won the fight to close the park to cars.
Source · NYC Parks, Washington Square Park ↗
The white marble arch with its relief panels and the avenue framed through it, the round fountain basin with a jet, the chess tables in the southwest corner, the red brick row houses on the north side. Mood: saturday afternoon. Everything is procedural geometry with painted surfaces; nothing is a scan or a photograph. The room is an interpretation, and it hangs the New Yorkers the census recorded at this place first.