CITYarts Reviews

Where do I even begin. There were so many red flags I should've listened to when I was being hired, like being asked to come in for an interview with an hour's notice. I had a bad gut feeling, but I ignored it because I was desperate for work, especially work that I thought would align with my values. I wish I read the other Glassdoor reviews before I accepted this position. They are all really accurate to the amount of mismanagement, hypocrisy, and delusion that fuels this nonprofit. Working with kids in art would be a lovely thing to devote your time to if it was run by someone who knew how to run an organization, didn't rely on unpaid interns to do everything, and didn't have a white savior complex. After a few weeks of working here, I realized the programming was directed at marginalized communities, but with a mindset dehumanizing to them. The Shakespeare Stairs mural in the Bronx was one of the most horrific examples of this. It was advertised as a "community project" when not a single person from the Bronx was listened to about what would adorn the stairs. The director herself decided that a cartoon image of Shakespeare would go into the mural, because of her problematic notion that people in the Bronx need to be more "cultured" with whatever she thinks is culture. When the artist from the Bronx stepped down due to this, the director didn't have enough integrity to be honest. She told everyone the artist quit because she wasn't a good enough artist to complete the project, when the truth was the artist quit because she was no longer painting something that engaged the community. At this point the cause of the organization was no longer worth the work conditions. I was being given large projects with little to no instructions all while having to make up tasks for the multitude of college/high school interns. Interns outnumbered actual staff members, creating more stress than help in making sure they were always doing something. Not to mention how rude the director is to everyone around her, except for her rich friends with questionable politics who pay her salary. She would spill paint on people's clothes and not even say "sorry," was constantly making a mess because someone else would clean it up. Staff were assigned chores in the office to essentially be her maids. This nonprofit is just a pet project for her ego and wallet, nothing more. The least this job could do is give sick days, but the director doesn't believe in them so I was consistently at my desk with stomach aches, fevers, and sneezing. It's a job that could easily be done remote, but requires 5 days in the cramped basement office. If you want to know more, just google "founder's syndrome" and read some articles on it. It describes the founder and director's psychology.

Tsipi Ben-Haim is a moron who believes herself a genius. This leads to some tense moments, to say the least. For instance, she think she is a brilliant communicator. She is very invested in the belief that she explains herself well, makes herself available for questions, and has created an office where people can help you when she isn't around. Instead, she gives nonsensical, vague, and often contradictory instructions with unrelated or incorrect information; she often looks at you like you're an idiot if she doesn't like your question, if she doesn't talk directly over you; and no one in her office has anything resembling the full-picture she think they do, because she hasn't bothered to make pertinent information readily available. She likes to think of herself as an "open-minded" person: another delusion of hers. If you use a pronoun that doesn't mesh with the gender she decides you are, get read to be misgendered constantly, even after multiple rounds of (public) conversations on the topic, during which she will smile and shake her head as if you were an eccentric child with a strange new hobby. Are you a POC? Well, get ready to be tested on every aspect of your cultures in front of a dozen people you just met for the benefit of her public edification on cultures she feels very, very sorry for. (She may even ask you about the common exports of your country of origin, before asking you about your interests and skills. Fun!) Her relationship to POC is particularly disturbing: while attempting to do outreach in communities of color, she repeats stereotypes, chastises protestors openly, and overall seems to talk about youth and children of color as though they need her help to remain docile, under control, and therefore worthy of respect in her world. This culminated in two instances where she touched two young, Black people without their consent: once to touch the person's hair, and once to remove their mask. CITYarts is Tsipi Ben-Haim's livelihood and nothing more. (You can look up her salary on the non-profit's 990. Bear in mind, she only has *3* employees.) She may be a talented salesperson, but so is Michael Scott. I personally see little difference, except Michael Scott at least tries to be nice to the people who work beneath him.