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When tourists are asked what comes to mind when they think of Boston, attractions like the Freedom Trail, Fenway Park, Old Ironsides, and the Old North Church often top the list. But as a native Bostonian, my landmark of choice holds a bit less historical gravitas. Every day, as I walk the Sugar Bowl of Southie, I spy its rounded outline across the Harbor. My one and only.
The Boston Gas Tank.
As in “the traffic is backed up all the way to the Tank,” WBZ’s all too familiar radio call to legions of frustrated motorists on I-93.
The hulking Dorchester monolith has been keeping an eye on the Southeast Expressway for decades now. But it went from a random utility company’s storage unit to “the Tank” in 1971. That was the year Eli Goldston, president of the then Boston Gas Company, commissioned a middle-aged ex-nun to create a piece of art for his facility. Her multi-colored paint stripes instantly struck a cultural nerve. The “Rainbow Swash” was born.
At just eighteen years old, Frances Elizabeth Kent joined the Order of the Immaculate Heart of Mary in 1936. Upon entering the convent, she took the name Sister Mary Corita. It wasn’t long before everyone referred to her simply as Corita, the name she would eventually make famous.
Her new community was known both for its progressive views and for an appreciation of the arts. This made for a perfect fit for the young nun. Her artistic ability was already well known, a talent that led to a faculty appointment in the art department of Immaculate Heart College. But it would be the influence of Andy Warhol’s 1962 soup can exhibition that would bring Corita into the Pop art fold, the medium that would catapult her career forward.
Like many good Catholic girls growing up in the shadow of the Tank, my mother made sure I was acquainted with the work of the ex-nun turned artist. It wasn’t that she was a big fan of her work. But like many women who came of age during pre-Vatican II, my mother appreciated the subtle and not so subtle resistance that simmered in many convents. Corita had developed a reputation by then as a social activist, most notably lending her voice to the anti-war movement. The Rainbow Swash, at least according to my mother, was proof positive of Corita’s liberal bent.
