The Portal has lifted the mood, not brought shame

IVISITED The Portal last week expecting to be shocked to my core by an obscene street show or some squalid porn. No such luck. The words ‘Portal Is Asleep – Back Up Soon’ pulsed across the giant screen while a bunch of youngsters held up a handmade sign bearing the words ‘Please reopen the Portal’ and posed for their phones.

This was the first laughter I’ve heard in a long time on that corner of Dublin’s North Earl Street and O’Connell Street. The next day, a tiny sign saying ‘The Portal RIP’ was tacked onto it with a few bunches of flowers below.

People huddled in good-humoured groups as if expecting a street performance or maybe a figure to emerge from the sculpture like a jack-in-the-box.

The Portal may be temporarily closed as a result of anti-social activity but it is still casting its charm.

Because of it, a corner of the inner city that has had its fair share of troubles has taken on the vibrancy of a bustling street, pushing out the normal din of hooligans tearing up the place, of mothers aggressively wrangling children and of panhandlers doing their thing.

I lived there more than 30 years ago when it was a tatty shopping street, relieved only by the trail of commuters from Connolly Station and Busáras.

An eerie silence descended at night, and although you might think twice about stepping out late, there was no anti-social activity that I recall.

But the area’s decline has been so steep that I thought the city council was off its rocker putting The Portal there.

I hadn’t anticipated how it would be a shot in the arm, alleviating the torpor induced by years of neglect and the stigma that comes from being a quasino-go area.

The change in mood lasted even when The Portal was put offline after only six days due to public high jinks, seeming to heap further shame on the area.

Instead of holding their nerve until the novelty had worn off, the authorities pulled the plug amid a blitz of accusations about Dubliners disgracing themselves and the proverbial ‘few rotten apples’.

Even Simon Harris joined the pile-on of inner-city prejudice.

The Portal is in a gritty area of town. Dubliners have a swaggering self-confidence, matched only perhaps by bombastic and brash New Yorkers. It was entirely predictable that both cities would leverage bawdy humour, exhibitionism and mutual taunts for the shock factor.

Also, The Portal is a work of art, created by the public and with the freedom to cause offence that underlines every art form from comedy to literature.

We might draw the line at showing 9/11 footage, or using it as a public urinal or as a window for Only Fans models to tout for business.

Yet these brazen and lewd actions are a document about public manners that is more remarkable than any sociological tract about human engagement in our hyper-connected world.

But the lesson is not so much about the ease with which intoxicated people take drugs or expose themselves for fun, but about how an art installation can lift the mood of a whole area.

The task force to restore ‘pride and vibrancy’ to Dublin city centre should take note.

It’s not rocket science. It doesn’t need elaborate public-private partnerships, demolition jobs or radical makeovers – although they would be nice.

If a giant webcam can move the dial on a down-at-heel area, then so could street art exhibitions, a busking arena and lush gardens.