April 24, 2013 — For the past nine months, I have walked almost daily under the squint of a giant Muppet ninja.
And while that might sound like the first sentence of the
confession of a profoundly disturbed soul, I am not paranoid. The entire city
of Boston can back me up.
Right across from the main entrance of the massive
transportation hub that is South Station is Dewey Square, a flat stretch of grass
backed by a building-sized air intake structure for Boston’s underground
highway.
The side of the intake that faces the square is a flat,
gridded wall with a hump on one side, hardly noticeably as anything but another
vertical city plane. But where I’ve always seen a bland, urban shape against a
background of bland, urban shapes, Os Gemeos saw a giant Muppet ninja.
And that’s why they’re artists.
Os Gemeos (“The Twins”) is the collective name of Brazilian
street artist/twin brothers Otavio and Gustavo Pandolfo. And the giant Muppet
ninja is what they gave Boston when they were commissioned to paint a mural on
this 70 X 70-foot surface as part of the opening of an exhibit of their art in
Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art.
Technically, the mural is untitled, but that’s a void that
obviously needs to be filled (giant Muppet ninja).
The figure fits with their usual motif of large
yellow-skinned people in colorful, contrasting getups. In this case, it’s a yellow-skinned,
barefooted figure in a yellow and green flowered shirt and red, blue, and
orange checked pants with a red jacket wrapped around his head so that only the
band of his eyes shows through. He’s sitting with his arms around his knees and
looks decidedly uncomfortable. Oh, and all of his buttons are yellow faces.
It kind of gives the effect that he’s wedging himself in
between the surrounding, and very gray, cityscape, a little bit ashamed (or
defiant) for not wearing business attire or a Red Sox cap. Or both. This is
Boston, after all.
When this thing went up in August 2012, a lot of people
thought it was inappropriately terrorist-looking. Others thought those people who
thought it was inappropriately terrorist-looking were being inappropriately racist
for interpreting the head cover that way.
Both groups were inappropriately missing the point. Which
is, naturally, that they had a giant Muppet ninja in their midst. It was
obviously so because that outfit could only be camouflage on either Sesame Street
or against the Electric Mayhem bus.
Of course, the artists say that they were just using one of
their signature figures to brighten up boring Boston with a bit of their
Brazilian flair.
All I know is that I have to look at this guy almost every
day, twice a day. He’s unavoidable. I’m not sure whether he makes my eyes sore
or gives them a rest from the glass and metal cage that is the city. I guess I won’t
know what I got ’til it’s gone. And it took me 25 years to finally see the wisdom
of the band Cinderella. I think that makes the mural an official success.
But it won’t be gone for a few more months. That Os Gemeos exhibit
at the ICA is long since shuttered, but the mural is slated to stay until at
least October of this year.
But you know those giant Muppet ninjas. Completely
unpredictable.
 |
| Side and back of the air intake structure. |
UPDATE (09.12.2013): The giant Muppet ninja is no more. Back to being an air vent.
