The Gallery

The pinkcomma gallery opens at a time of shifting design sensibilities in Boston. No longer exclusively clad in brick, a few recent institutional buildings in the city indicate an acceptance of fresh and adventurous architecture—reminiscent of the late modernist period when Boston’s new structures were a part of the international vanguard. Yet the work produced in the local establishment is often far from inventive or original. This gallery hopes to foster and recognize a more creative, youthful, and experimental scene that has grown out of one of the world’s most significant capitals of architectural education. For all the city’s stodginess, Boston’s five architecture schools and their instructors have unleashed some of the most provocative figures on the world scene. Why hasn’t this culture permeated the city’s own architectural sense of itself?

It seems clear to us that such a culture is on the rise, yet is in desperate need of independent venues to foster its growth. pinkcomma will showcase Boston’s new architectural underground—in a space that is literally and windowlessly subterranean. We hope to encourage broader popular support for this underground sensibility. At the same time, pinkcomma will be a place for the exchange and expansion of ideas within Boston’s larger design scene, not just in terms of architecture, but also in the disciplines of landscape, graphics, urbanism, interiors, and industrial design, among many other fields.

pinkcomma exists outside Boston’s power circles, yet strives to make design more pivotal in the city’s political discourse. The gallery’s role will be activist in nature, promoting works that may be at times politically unpalatable or financially untenable, unpopular or unacknowledged. For this reason, the Rethinking City Hall exhibit seemed a natural fit for the gallery’s inaugural show. It is both a protest against the mayor’s desire to abandon an enormously important civic building as well as a conceptual foray into urgent questions at the intersection of contemporary life and an aging modernist tradition. The teams included are young thinkers of diverse interests hailing from across the globe. Boston is their new home. Their works offer us a window into the city’s architectural underground.

Mark Pasnik and Chris Grimley, Directors.

Curatorial Team
• Chris Grimley and Mark Pasnik, curators
• Heather Powers and Ryan Pinkham, assistant curators

Contributors

This exhibition is supported by the Boston Society of Architects and ArchitectureBoston. Special recognition is due to the many contributors who helped in its preparation: Gerhard Kallmann, Michael McKinnell, Roberto de Oliveira Castro, Rami el Samahy, Kelly Hutzell, Kelly Smith, Blaine Abaray, Sean Brennan, Darin Barnes, Kyle Jonasen, Benjamin Hochberg, Joe Gora, Elizabeth Padjen, and Pamela de Oliveira Smith.

Current

Urban Housing Atlas

February 29th - March 14th: Urban Housing Atlas. Launch and exhibit for the architecture firm Utile's housing projects.

Urban Housing Atlas is a compendium of more than twenty multi-family projects that Utile, a Boston-based architecture and urban planning firm, has designed from 2003 through 2007. The book was originally developed as an in-house manual to record housing solutions and to share the knowledge gained among the office's growing staff. In its expanded form, the publication displays many of the discoveries of Utile's extensive involvement with housing in the region's mid-market urban infill sites. As part of its design methodology, the firm always seeks an approach that produces innovation as well as interesting and marketable units - all within tight constraints of regulatory codes and without sacrificing efficiency and development realism.

This book represents the first in a series of publications supported by pinkcommabooks, a division of the pinkcomma gallery. Please join us for the launch of the book and an exhibition showcasing Utile's housing projects.

Exhibit 29 February 2008 through 14 March 2008

Reception 29 February 2008, 6-9 p.m.

Hours: Monday-Friday 9 a.m.-5 p.m. or by appointment.

Rethinking City Hall

The exhibition "Rethinking Boston City Hall" exhibition will travel to Wentworth Institute of Technology in February, 2007. More details will be available online in late January. Below is the gallery's tentative winter/spring schedule. To join the event notification list, please send emails to info (at) pinkcomma.com.

Upcoming

May 16th - June 6th: YBA. Coinciding with the AIA convention, we host an exhibit and installation by nine young boston architecture firms

June 13th - July 4th: Venue. An exhibition on the game "Rock Band," which explores the design process and the spatial environments created for this popular and sophisticated video game.

July 11th - August 1st: Vessel. An exhibit documenting the work of this talent Boston industrial design company.

September - Concrete Toronto v. Concrete Boston.