Streeter: Statues should tell stories, not just praise powerful people

After protesters in 2020 toppled the Christopher Columbus statue in Little Italy and dumped it into the harbor like so much British tea, I remember walking past the shockingly empty pedestal on a jaunt to get cannoli at Vaccaro’s and wondering what this moment of cultural evolution would bring.

I am not Italian American, so I can’t speak to the strong feelings that some in that neighborhood have for their famous exploring countryman. However, I’ve never understood why that man, who never set foot on this continent and was responsible for the enslavement and genocide of the Arawak people, was such a symbol of pride. Not my place to say.

But I am excited at the prospect of gazing upon Columbus’ replacement, announced last week: a depiction of an Italian immigrant family to be created by artist Sebastian Martorana, which will represent the people who braved a harsh ocean voyage and helped build and mold this city.

That seems so beautiful and appropriate, a reminder of ancestors who bridge the Old World and the New. I’d love more public art like this: works that represent not just a person’s likeness, but a concept, like the hope of a people. Monuments should tell stories, not just boast individuals.

“What does the artist choose? What story are they going to tell?” said Mary Ann Mears, a sculptor and member of the city’s Public Art Commission. “You want to tell more than ‘Here’s just a picture of a guy.’”

I think of well-done creative expressions of tragedy, like Harbor East’s National Katyn Memorial Park, which has placards describing the massacre of Polish soldiers by the Russian army, surrounding a dramatic depiction of figures wrapped in flames. Or statues of historic figures that create context, like the panels at the base of the Billie Holiday tribute on Pennsylvania Avenue in Upton that movingly and literally depict some of the lyrics of “Strange Fruit” and “God Bless the Child.”

The Holiday statue is a good example of how public consciousness can change over time when it comes to feelings about public art. The large base of the monument illustrated scenes, including one of a Black man being lynched, that were considered too controversial at the time of its installation in 1985. It was placed on a concrete pedestal instead, upsetting its artist, James Earl Reid, so much that he skipped the ceremonial opening. But over decades, through several rounds of funding and changing leadership, the original concept for the base was installed in 2009. The whole process is emblematic of how public art is reflective not just of history but also of the era in which it was installed.

“We have artists today doing representational art, just brilliant work. They’re very thorough about how they go about commentating on whoever it is. It’s commemorative, not just Ozymandian,” Mears said, referencing the Percy Bysshe Shelley poem about a decaying statue of a once-great, now-forgotten king. It’s a metaphor not just for crumbling societies thought to have been indestructible, but for the way that our views of those societies and their lauded leaders, like Columbus, can change.

A lot of art throughout history “was driven by politics and celebrating the power,” Mears said.

The Confederate monuments that were removed around the city nine years ago — good riddance! — were certainly driven by a political and cultural need to remind everyone who had power and who didn’t. And historically, men were the ones not only in power, but in bronze. Mears noted that when the figures weren’t men, “it was women in wet drapery, placing a crown on a man’s head,” much like the subject of one of those infernal Confederate behemoths.

The future immigrant family monument reminds me of the Alex Haley statue in Annapolis, depicting the late author of “Roots” reading to children at City Dock, where Haley’s ancestor Kunta Kinte was brought to America from Gambia in chains. Although Kinte didn’t board the ship that ferried him here voluntarily, as the Italians did, the tribute is about how the people we are all descended from had no idea how their arrival would change the world. I love that.

Mears did caution me that it’s important not to be absolutist about art from another time, given its context. Work in a museum “is about the artist and artistry of the piece,” even if the subject is terrible, like Henry VIII. “If you’re a student of history, you want to know what he looked like to an artist in the day. But if it’s on our civic space, that has a different meaning.”

The statue of Christopher Columbus means and projects something different now than it did when it was installed, and that’s a good thing. “The whole idea of what public art means is that it contributes to your culture and the legacy of our time,” Mears said.

I agree. And I get excited by what current figures my child and his contemporaries are going to deem worthy of permanent tribute. I hope it’s a cool concept that considers and chronicles why that person, movement or point in history deserves to stand the test of time. It doesn’t have to make sense to me, as long as there’s a community that is moved to thought and action by it.

Unless it’s, like, the new Xbox or whoever last won “Love Island.” Some things don’t need to be remembered that long.