Back in the boom years of the dot-com bubble, technology start-ups bloomed like weeds in a vacant lot. They marketed premises, and sometimes only even just their names, and got tons of funding for just the idea of being something. We all know what happened to 99% of those corporations.
Here in Portland, we’ve got the opposite problem: we’ve got genuine cultural assets that you can see, hear, touch, and feel. But there’s not bricks-and-mortar support from the community. With the exception of the new Gerding Theater at the old Armory (for Portland Center Stage), there has been no new, major, purpose-built cultural building proposed for the Portland area.
Here’s a snippet from an article about the Dallas area and its support for the orchestra and other cultural institutions that I found to be quite telling:
The Dallas Arts District is expanding with two long-awaited new facilities, both designed by international “starchitects.” The Dallas Center for the Performing Arts’ Winspear Opera House, by London’s Foster and Partners, and the Wyly Theatre, by Rem Koolhaas and Joshua Prince-Ramus, are both due to open in fall 2009. A year later, a smaller City Performance Hall will round out a concentration of visual- and performing-arts facilities unmatched anywhere.
“There’s a demonstrated commitment to the arts and culture and quality of life,” Mr. Adams says of Dallas, “and it’s demonstrated in a physical sense in the Meyerson Symphony Center, where the DSO plays, being one of the finest concert halls in America. The new buildings next door are further evidence of that commitment. The idea of Dallas being a can-do city is not just PR.”
It’s time for Portland to step up and support a major, purpose-built, new home for the Oregon Symphony, with a recital hall and management offices all under the same roof. We can talk about how much of a great, visionary, progressive city we are, but until we have a showcase for our primary cultural assets, it’s all still just talk.
And, coincidentally, here’s an article from today’s Seattle Times, telling the story behind their spectacular Benaroya Hall, which began with an organization in dire financial straits, and with no readily perceivable sources of public financing.