Boston’s slow but certain swing towards modernism

Photo Credit: Liza Voll

The following was written by BosGuy friend and occasional blog contributer, Michael C.

RANT – Ask anyone living in Boston and they’ll agree that it is a city with an almost fetishistic fixation on the old-school. The traditional colonial esthetic and the often misguided notion of deference to historical accuracy. In fact, this fixation has earned Boston the reputation among its more avant-garde residents as the city where everything is forced to “blend in”. No esthetic deviations from Victorian and Beaux Arts allowed here! Although most of my friends have already listened to my spiel, for the benefit of everyone else who hasn’t, I’ll say again that the most glaring example of Boston’s mentality has manifested itself through the new Liberty Mutual building – causing every modernist hair on this guy’s head to stand on its root. The way I see it, we had an opportunity that in a big city comes about once – maybe twice – every fifty years or so: to build a major landmark from the ground up. And how did we respond to that challenge? Perhaps by creating something exciting that will go on to become an architectural reference point for generations of future architects – an architectural icon? Oh no – instead, we thought it was a better idea to erect – again, from the ground up – a monolith that’s deliberately intended to mimic its neighbor, the original Hancock building, completed in 1922. Cutting edge, eh? These are the moments I catch myself exclaiming, sometimes out loud, “Seriously?!”

While we’re at it, can we talk about the MFA and Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum? We commissioned two starchitects, Norman Foster and Renzo Piano, to design the state-of-the-art additions to the respective museum buildings. Several years of much-publicized mega construction and anticipation later and all we have is two boxy, painfully unimaginative, boring stone and glass cubes. Why bother commissioning celebrity architects only to stifle their creativity and compromise their vision? Excuse me, but has anyone seen the new wing at Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum? Oh I’m sorry, I forgot – that’s a “monstrosity” by Boston standards. Oh quit your grumbling, you say. What about the ICA, our museum dedicated to modern art? Do you mean, that token modern building that’s banished to Fan Pier, like a petulant child in time-out since 2006, because out there in the wilderness there’s nothing to make it conform to. That building, designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro, that happens to be conveniently hidden out of immediate sight so as not to upset our Quaker sensibilities? Yes, that one.

END OF RANT – But lest you think I’m judgmental grouch, let me clarify the rationale behind my grouching. I’m actually going somewhere with this. You see, having resigned to the expectation that Boston will remain the city that says no to 21^st century esthetics, I’ve found myself pleasantly surprised and my spirits lifted by my recent string of experiences in our fair city’s cultural scene. Let me share a few.

THE PERFORMING ARTS – As a passionate lover of opera, that decidedly old-school art form, I’ve always felt frustrated with the Boston Lyric Opera company’s reluctance to recognize that, in the absence of a hefty endowment and production budget like the Met’s, grand opera on limited funding is miserable. Miserable in look and feel. Miserable in creativity. Generally, pretty pathetic. But by George, recently BLO’s got it! As they demonstrated through their last couple of seasons, when one embraces Modern like one means it, the results can be quite astonishing, and with no fewer octogenarian patrons than in past seasons. Wagner’s Flying Dutchman, performed amid raw scaffolding and moving rough seas projected on the massive stage wall. La Traviata and Cosi Fan Tutte, both operas in period costume albeit on dreamy, Dali-esque sets. And of course La Bohème, the bread and butter of the global lyric stage, still set in Paris, but moved from late 19^th century to the 1960s with bell-bottom denim and shaggy shearling vests. To boot, embracing a modern production typically carries the added bonus of freeing up budget, which allows focus on what matters the most – the music – while forcing beauty to shine through simplicity and minimalism without polluting it with shoddy ornamentation and kitschy embellishment. So, kudos to BLO from your humble young(er) patron! As an afterthought however, one does have to wonder whether those schlocky sets and school-play costumes of the past were more a result of bowing to the demands of a visually conservative audience rather than the work of a narrow-minded production team.

THE PUBLIC ART– Another breath of fresh air is the large-scale, 10-floor tall “swimmer” mural by secretive French artist JR on the southwestern side of 200 Clarendon, formerly the Hancock Tower. A man on a diving raft, floating in the middle of a “sea” of glass. How cool is that? Spectacular in its appearance and so clever in its simplicity (why didn’t I think of that?). Then there’s Janet Echelman’s hypnotic aerial sculpture As If It Were Already Here that for six months graced the space above the Rose Kennedy Greenway outside South Station. Does this art installation represent art in the sense that it depicts a person or a flower or a landscape? Who cares? The question we should be asking ourselves is “does it make me think?” Even if that means scratching my head trying to understand what the hell I’m looking at, the piece has fulfilled its purpose. You may never figure it out and that’s perfectly fine, but consider this: it’s in the financial district. It’s a part of town crowded with men in pleated pants and shirts that fit looser than a tent. Isn’t it just awesome to inject into that habitat something forward-looking, something quirky, something esoteric and different? Don’t answer – it’s a rhetorical question.

THE NEIGHBORHOOD – Have you seen that remarkable home on South End’s Taylor Street, which I’ve dubbed “the Shutter House”? I have no idea what the owners had to do to get the city to OK it (and frankly I’m not even sure I want to know) but whatever they had to do, it was well worth the certain ordeal. For people who love modern architecture the appeal is pretty straightforward. Others may see it as a hideous affront to the neighborhood’s homogeneous character, style and historical integrity and it’s their right and privilege to see it that way. But in fact, that home acts as an enhancer of the quaint charm of the picturesque Victorian one-block street, if not its whole immediately surrounding neighborhood. By its arrival on the block as an alternative modern kid in an overwhelmingly historic environment, Shutter House has achieved a great success: for from attacking history, it complements and elevates it, making it even prettier – and more obvious to appreciate. Personal tastes notwithstanding, the house is esthetically beautiful. Even if you don’t believe in esthetic diversity, period, you may want to read the Globe’s write-up on Shutter House. Getting acquainted with it will almost certainly help you at least appreciate it as the triumph it represents. As long as something is well-made with good taste, meticulous care and obvious passion, it’s beautiful. Get over it and guess what – there are some real eye sores out there and this brave little house isn’t one of them.

THE HIGH HORSE, DISMOUNTED – OK, I’ll stop. Let’s just say that to watch Boston’s esthetic palate evolve over the next 5 years given this glacial shift in direction, will be riveting – and I’ll leave it at that. With the supremely boring but unquestionably modern Millennium Tower nearly finished and the impressively funky (dare I say, gasp, futuristic?) new Government Center T station entrance nearing completion, modernists and eurotrash all over town are holding their collective breath. But let’s not jump the gun here. Baby steps is the name of the game, and that is something even the most enthusiastic modernist must respect. As the traditionalist Bostonian will argue, if you want to see glass high-rises and funky museums getting yanked out of the ground every week, move to Miami. This is Boston. Fair enough, I say. But let me ask you this, traditionalists – yes, you. While busy rolling around in your conformist self-righteousness, have you noticed that the shape of the new Government Center T station is a nod to the Old State House a block down the street? If that’s not the ultimate bow to history by modernism, I don’t know what is – just saying.

About the author:  A former banker, Michael C offsets the sobriety of his professional life with his passion for design, music, the arts and anything beautiful.

© Michael Constantinides 2016 – all rights reserved