Mural By Famed Graffiti Artist David Choe Defaced On Lower East Side

LOWER EAST SIDE, NY — Vandals have defaced a mural completed last week by famous graffiti artist David Choe.

The painting at the Houston Bowery Wall on the Lower East Side was completed on June 4 by Choe, who made millions after painting a mural for Facebook's Silicon Valley headquarters.

It was tagged sometime over the weekend, according to neighborhood blog Bowery Boogie which was first to report that it had been defaced. On Monday, black letters sprayed over the work said "BTM."

It's an apparent reference to the graffiti organization Big Time Mafia. Patch was not able to verify that Big Time Mafia was responsible for the overlaying graffiti or to contact anybody in the loosely-organized group.

It's unclear why the mural was tagged, but Choe has been a controversial figure in the street art community since 2014 when he admitted to "rapey behavior" during a podcast. Choe told his co-host about masturbating during a massage, and then touching the masseuse's butt without her permission before grabbing her hands and placing them on his erect penis, according to a transcript of the podcast from BuzzFeed.

Choe said on the podcast that the masseuse was "definitely not into it, but she's not stopping it either."

Choe later said that the stories he told on the podcast weren't factual or "a representation of my reality" and denied raping anyone.

Neither Choe nor Goldman Properties, which owns the wall and commissions different artists to work on it, responded to requests for comment from Patch.

Lead image by Ciara McCarthy / Patch.