Wrecking Ball

As I was digging through my filing cabinet looking for stuff for my retrospective of DUCKWORK, I found this page from an old school catalog showing what once was the Philadelphia College of Art. The blue border shows the boundaries of the old campus. The shot was taken from the Southwest aiming towards the Northeast.

In this picture which I have doctored the red area indicates a large section of the city that is no more. Anderson Hall at Broad and Spruce that held the classrooms has reverted to an office building. The school still owns the building at Broad and Pine, but the spot next to it, Arco Park, the stores, apartment building, The Swamp (where the cool kids lived), The Bellrich Hotel, Corson’s Pharmacy – all gone!

This shot is almost the opposite angle of the catalog photo. This is from the East pointing West. In the background, you can see the fabulous Drake Hotel. The thing that looks like a 45 record changer or part of the spaceship from Silent Running is the Kimmel Center. It’s a massive music hall and performance center that has eaten up the red area in my doctored photograph.

Here’s another view looking South on Broad Street. The building on the right is where PCA held the majority of its classes. It is once again an office building with dueling steak houses on the ground floor, strangely enough. The windows with the green awnings is one steakhouse and the windows with the red awnings is an entirely different steakhouse. They were once an art supply store and the school’s gallery. Now they sell meat and more meat. Weird.