Vicki Khuzami reclines lazily in a leopard-print armchair, her feet resting on a small stool. Over her shoulder, an open window allows the sounds of Thompson Street in the Village- a woman singing or a docile bark from the pet store below - to fill her studio apartment.

Thus, it is extremely appropriate that Khuzami created "Bohemorama," a glass-encased mural against the exterior of the Associated Supermarket at Bleecker Street and LaGuardia Place. The 4 feet by 24 feet canvas honors 25 of Greenwich Village's most illustrious and prolific Bohemians. They cover several generations, starting with Edgar Allan Poe - believed to be the father of American bohemianism - and continuing to the present with Bob Dylan and Joan Baez. Many other folk singers, social activists, jazz singers, playwrights, filmmakers and painters are highlighted in the work.

"I see many parallels and similarities between myself and the Bohemians," says Khuzami, who particularly enjoys the Beat poets. "I relate to them. They had a hunger and thirst to keep learning and experiencing. They were always putting themselves in new and unknown situations. In my mural I wanted to recreate that struggle, that intimacy of bohemian life."

Khuzami was born during the zenith of the Beat movement, just a few years after Allen Ginsberg's arrival in Greenwich Village. Her parents, who managed and taught at the famed Arthur Murray's Dance Studio in Brooklyn, always encouraged creative and liberal thinking.

"My father taught us chess so that he could analyze our development and psychological growth," Khuzami says. In lieu of Sunday morning Presbyterian Bible classes, her father led family discussions about contemporary issues and lessons on other religions. Khuzami's father nurtured her bohemian temperament even in college. In a letter he wrote her that began "Dear Princess with a cold," he stated the five key principles of happiness: health, integrity and the pursuit of truth, development of one's talents, human relationships and independence. After graduating from college, Khuzami accompanied one of her professors to India to assist in the making of a documentary. Captivated by the East and the excitement of travel, it was several years before she returned to New York. She journeyed through India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand and hiked the Himalayan Mountains. In Japan, she studied art and architecture by day. By night, she was a hostess in a nightclub, where her job was to light men's cigarettes and peel their concord grapes.

Through the years, art has remained her priority. All her disposable income is recycled back into her art. Her work can be found at Tokyo Disneyland, The United States Capitol and author Tom Robbins' living room.

But while Khuzami retained her bohemian sensibility, the same cannot be said for the Village. The artists and authors that enamored writers like Dan Wakefield in the 1950s and 1960s have all but deserted the neighborhood, crowded out by sports bars on Bleecker and high rents. The change has been so radical and widespread that Khuzami is one of the few holdouts left in the neighborhood. "The reason why I created "Bohemorama" is because the Village has lost its affordable rents, and therefore it has lost its Bohemian crowd," Khuzami says. "We have witnessed the death of the Village - as it has been known for over 100 years - as a safe haven and creative environment for artists, musicians and writers."

She, too, was pushed out of the Village when she lost the lease on her art studio of 14 years. Commercialism and the success of "dot-coms" in the late 1990s caused rents to triple, and when her lease was up she could no longer afford the space. Her studio, "one of the last funky, big, raw spaces that artists could have," was converted into "plush offices." She now rents a studio for triple her previous rent on 39th Street.

Though she still laments the loss, Khuzami is actually more fortunate than most. Many of her friends and fellow artists were driven out of Manhattan altogether, to places like Williamsburg and beyond, in search of affordable space to create art. "All the favorite old haunts are all going," Khuzami says. "Physically I enjoy living here because of the smallness of the area, but the creative stimulation isn't here anymore. It would take something happening that would cause a huge exodus from the city for there to ever be an environment like the old Greenwich Village, and no one wants that to happen.