AN ILL-FITTING COHEN TRIBUTE
Giant mural seems wrong: Brownstein
It could have been worse. At least it’s not a crude etching of him on a temporary vinyl covering a city bus shelter. Or some roughly hewn sculpture of him on a granite stump atop Mount Royal.
Yes, there could certainly have been potential for some really tacky ways to honour Leonard Cohen, who passed away at 82 in November — particularly in the year of Montreal’s surreal 375th birthday bash. On the other hand, well-intended though it may be, creating a massive 8,500-square-metre mural likeness of the iconic Montreal poet/troubadour on the side of a 20-storey building on Crescent St. seems so wrong.
For starters, size matters. In this case, there’s far too much of it. Cohen was a modest, highly religious man. Nothing selfaggrandizing about him.
No doubt that the Cohen tribute will be respectfully handled by Montreal artist Gene Pendon (a.k.a. Starship) — also responsible for the Dany Laferrière and Oscar Peterson murals for the non-profit MU group — and American artist El Mec. Regardless, the side of a 20-storey building would be more appropriate for a Batman beacon, but this ain’t Gotham City — not just yet anyway, and we don’t want to give our mayor any more grandiose ideas, either. Or maybe it’s the spot to stick a giant CH emblem, to strike fear in the hearts of Habs opponents, who do frequently congregate on Crescent.
This is not a knock on Crescent St., a hub for locals and tourists and visiting hockey teams alike. Crescent was Nick Auf der Maur’s street, and the powers-that-be rightly named an alleyway off it, Ruelle Nick-Auf der Maur, for the fun-loving and beloved boulevardier, journo and city councillor. It was also a street much favoured by Mordecai Richler — who was to be honoured too many years later with a ludicrous, costly gazebo on the side of Mount Royal.
But Crescent was not Cohen’s street. Rest assured Cohen was never out there guzzling back bubbly with F1 aficionados or gazing lustily at the Ferraris lining the street during Grand Prix festivities. And rest assured these lyrics penned by Cohen didn’t emanate from a Crescent St. pub:
“Now, I’ve heard there was a secret chord
That David played, and it pleased the Lord
But you don’t really care for music, do you?
It goes like this, the fourth, the fifth
The minor fall, the major lift The baffled king composing hallelujah …”
Then again, some might feel that these Cohen lyrics could serve as an ode to the street:
“Yeah the women tear their blouses off
And the men they dance on the polka-dots
And it’s partner found, it’s partner lost
And it’s hell to pay when the fiddler stops
It’s closing time …”
The fact of the matter is that the Main was Cohen’s street — when not on a Greek island or on a Californian mountain. Though born and raised in Westmount, Cohen found solace in his Plateau duplex, just off St-Laurent Blvd. and facing the quaint Parc du Portugal. When in town, Cohen could be often caught having a late breakfast at Bagel Etc or a midnight nosh at the Main Deli Steak House in the ’hood.
The Main, often referred to as the mythical line that used to divide the city between anglophones and francophones, was what Cohen was all about. But Cohen was able to cross the cultural divide like few anglo artists. Of course, he didn’t dabble in politics, which was what made Richler such a divisive figure, particularly among Québécois nationalist circles. But it was more than that. Cohen’s writings and music resonated with so many cultural communities, in many parts of the world, yet he was particularly revered within the franco community here.
A much more fitting mural commemorating Cohen is scheduled to be created this summer on the side of the nine-storey Cooper Building on St-Laurent Blvd. as part of the annual Mural Festival on the Main. Business owners on the Main will be footing the entire bill for this mural.
“We had been talking about doing a mural on the Main since his 80th birthday, but then all of a sudden we hear that the main mural, which is city sponsored, is going up on this big building on Crescent — we were really taken aback,” says Christine Gosselin, the Projet Montréal councillor for Jeanne-Mance. “The mural slated for the Cooper Building will be great, and I feel that’s the one that Leonard would be most comfortable with, because it’s in his ’hood.”
Gosselin doesn’t feel Crescent St. is an appropriate spot for a Cohen mural. “Everyone agrees we have to pay tribute to Leonard, but that’s not where he lived. It’s also the size factor. He was so unassuming. I don’t think Leonard would have liked this giant image of him looming over downtown.”