Joe Brandt has been a digital content producer for CBS News Philadelphia since 2022. He is a Temple University graduate and was born and raised in Pitman, NJ.
Isaiah Zagar, a mosaic artist who founded Philadelphia's Magic Gardens, died Thursday at age 86, from complications related to congestive heart failure and Parkinson's Disease, the local art space announced.
The Magic Gardens are a rite of passage for any first-time visitor to the City of Brotherly Love, and a fixture of the South Street streetscape. Practically every square inch of the Magic Gardens museum, on South Street between 10th and 11th, is covered in mosaics made from bits of glass bottles, mirrors, tiles and found objects like bike wheels.
While the Magic Gardens are his best-known work, Zagar is responsible for more than 50,000 square feet of mosaic works around Philadelphia, and created over 200 other works across four other states and in Mexico and Chile.
Born March 18, 1939, in Philadelphia, Zagar was raised in Brooklyn, New York, before marrying his wife Julia in 1963 and spending three years in the Peace Corps with her in Peru.
Zagar returned to Philly in 1968, moved to South Street and never left. Julia opened Eye's Gallery that year at 402 South Street, and it served as home for over 50 years before it was damaged in the fire that gutted Jim's Steaks next door.
Jim's later purchased the former gallery space as an expansion of the renovated cheesesteak restaurant. You can see plenty of Zagar's work on the second floor.
Isaiah Zagar began the work on the Magic Gardens in 1986 and the project later expanded to multiple adjacent properties.
"He loved South Street, the city of Philadelphia, and the community fostered here with all of his heart. While Isaiah lived with ups and downs of mental health struggles, and later with Parkinson's Disease, he endlessly turned to his art-making to not only express himself, but as a tool to survive," the Philadelphia Magic Gardens' executive director, Emily Smith, said in a statement.
The Magic Gardens Museum and Magic Gardens Studio are owned by a nonprofit and have a full-time preservation team that worked alongside Zagar for over a decade.
A public memorial service will be announced later. The Magic Gardens asked for donations to the organization's preservation fund in lieu of flowers.
"Isaiah was more than our founder; he was our close friend, teacher, collaborator, and creative inspiration. He was unlike anyone we have ever met and will ever meet. Above all things, he was an artist. In his lifetime, he created a body of work that is unique and remarkable, and one that has left an everlasting mark on our city," an Instagram post honoring Zagar read.