

Christy Rupp's Rat Patrol posters

On May 10th, 1979, a woman was attacked by a "pack of rats" in Tribeca—some say a few of them even got in her car when she tried to flee. A couple of days later the NY Times ran this horrifying account:

"A woman walking toward her parked car on Ann Street, just south of City Hall, felt a tug on her leg. The tug became a sharp, searing pain. The woman screamed. She was being attacked by a pack of rats, one of which apparently bit her leg. The account of the attack, provided by witnesses, was released by the police. One of the witnesses was a man who said he had run to help the victim, pulling off his light summer jacket to wave the rats away. But more rats appeared, and the man ran to dial 911. Meanwhile, the woman leaped into her car and drove off. She was in a 'state of hysteria,' witnesses said. The rats were still there when police arrived minutes later."

An expert at the Department of Health determined the rats on Ann Street were Norway rats, which have also been called "super rats" because of their resistance to rodentcides. They can measure up to a foot-long, and weigh around one-pound.



Rupp's rubble rats (Brooklyn Museum)

Enter: Christy Rupp's "Rat Patrol" project. As Gallery 98 points out, Rupp put up her rat posters wherever she saw rats taking over, and they got "widespread media attention in 1979 during a contentious, three-week strike by NYC sanitation workers... just down the street from her loft in the financial district, became a magnet for the press when witnesses reported that a woman had been attacked there by a pack of rats." Since Rupp had already taken note of the rat problem in that area, her posters were all over, which gave the photographers covering the story a great visual.

On her website, Rupp explains how her poster project started: "The garbage strike of 1979 went on for 3 weeks, creating habitat opportunity with every accumulating pile of garbage. I started pasting these up as a way to mark areas that were infested, so people could avoid walking through dangerous areas in which rats were defending their territories. I 'borrowed' a sanitation ad from a subway car of this lifesize rat and had it offset printed. Never intending to defend rats, I wanted to point out how we had created a habitat for them, and they would naturally occupy it." Here's that subway poster:

Rupp's interest in rats didn't end there; she soon landed a job at the Museum of Natural History, where she says, "Dr. Betty Faber, a behavioral entomologist and cockroach guru, let me photograph her work and make dioramas. There, I began to work on getting past the 'eek' factor that is such a potent force. You have to notice that power of being grossed out in order to work with it." And then came The Times Square Show (TTS), housed inside of an old massage parlor, which featured Rupp's "spray paintings of rats on newspaper, sets of life-size plaster rats, the poster, lots of other objects made of plastic and rubber, and stickers and buttons."

Hyperallergic interviewed Rupp earlier this year, and unearthed this video she created in 1980 along with Dr. Betty Faber, where in addition to rats, you'll also get roaches:

Around the time of her Animals Living In Cities show at ABC No Rio in 1980, she told the Post, "I don't for a minute want people to think that this show is defending rats... rats should be seen not as filthy little things. Rats are a symptom. Garbage is the cause."

Rupp wasn't the only creative to delve into the world of NYC rats—ten years later, David Lynch also tackled the issue: