Housing

More artists displaced by development

by Mike Miliard

Another one bites the dust.

As the mayor proudly steered a wrecking ball into its brick walls, a group of former residents gathered at a loft space on Kingston Street last Friday, outfitted in masks, face paint, and makeshift sandwich boards emblazoned with R.I.P. ARTISTS' SPACE AND COMMUNITY.

The building, which as recently as two weeks ago provided housing and work space for about 45 artists and musicians, was a crucial gathering place for -- in the words of former resident Mike Dillon -- "a wide array of freaksters" from Boston's underground art community. Now it will be removed to make room for the mammoth One Lincoln Street office tower. At 36 stories, it's the largest office building to be constructed in Boston in 10 years.

Funded by Columbia Plaza Associates, a multiethnic development group, One Lincoln Street represents the fruit of 13 years of work. After many setbacks, it is clearly a boon for its minority backers. But, as Dillon puts it, "It's great for them, bad for us."

In addition to the artists' living and work space, the building housed the Oni Gallery and played host to concerts by acts such as Shellac, the Make-Up, and the Wicked Farleys. No more. "We're here protesting the marginalization of the artist community," Dillon says. "This is really the last building of its kind. Where can we go from here?"

His point about marginalization was illustrated by the 10 or so mostly silent former residents, standing near a white tent playing host to a group of well-dressed backers. As the displaced artists took advantage of the free food, they went largely unnoticed by those celebrating the building's demolition.

Despite the success of CPA's venture, and Menino's excitement about One Lincoln Street's positive effects on Chinatown, the Financial District, and the Boston skyline, Dillon mourns the loss of affordable space for artists in the city. "This is the last chapter in a saga of artist displacement that began back in the late '80s," he says. More to the point, he echoes graffiti scrawled on the empty building: "I guess what this housing crisis needs is another office space."