From Memory to Memorial by J. William Thompson

Author:J. William Thompson [Thompson, J. William]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Modern, 21st Century, United States, State & Local, Middle Atlantic (DC; DE; MD; NJ; NY; PA), Architecture, Landscape, Americas (North; Central; South; West Indies)
ISBN: 9780271078977
Google: 1GTJDQAAQBAJ
Publisher: Penn State Press
Published: 2017-03-08T00:26:27+00:00

Fig. 11 The World War II Memorial on the National Mall is a traditional memorial that boasts fountains, classical columns, and heroic inscriptions. Photo: Corey Seeman.

These are memorial expressions stripped to their absolute essence—sans heroic inscriptions, sans explicit imagery, sans overt symbolism. An art form that expressed no feeling and (supposedly) carried no message had become the model for memorials to such emotion-laden topics as war, trauma, and tragic death.

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One prominent memorial, however, broke away from that lineage. The National World War II Memorial, just a stone’s throw from the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, looks backward to the memorial design that existed in all the centuries before 1981.

Strategically situated between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial, the World War II Memorial is a seven-acre plaza of white granite framed by triumphal arches and heroic pillars and decked out with bronze eagles, wreaths, and heroic inscriptions. A fountain in the middle of a central pool flings water triumphantly into the air. The overall impression is almost breast-beatingly celebratory, leaving a visitor in absolutely no doubt that the American role in World War II was both morally right and one of this country’s grandest military achievements. Architecture critics writing in the Boston Herald, the Washington Post, the Philadelphia Enquirer, the Los Angeles Times, and other publications almost universally scourged the project for its apparent pomposity and its high-handed imagery, reminiscent of imperial and even fascist regimes. For example, a headline in the Baltimore Sun read, “Monument Proposal Draws Criticism: Design’s Appearance Called Similar to That of Nazi Architecture.”

It may come as a great surprise, then, that this memorial is one of the most visited and most loved by the American public. It ranks third in visitation in the country, exceeded only by the Lincoln Memorial and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, and ahead of the Statue of Liberty, the Washington Monument, the Jefferson Memorial, and every other U.S. memorial.

TripAdvisor, the online travelers’ commentary site where anyone can post frank opinions about dingy motel rooms and surly waiters, gave the memorial a certificate of excellence based on 3,037 reviews, many of which are almost rhapsodic. Crowds flock to the memorial, even at night, practically lending it an amusement-park atmosphere.

The fact that this memorial is “the people’s choice” despite the critical “thumbs down” points to the chasm between popular and elite taste in America. The Flight 93 leadership sought to bridge the gap between those two worlds in the way it chose the winning entry for the 9/11 memorial.

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A common process for choosing the design of a memorial involves a design jury, typically made up of design professionals, such as architects and landscape architects, and professionals from the worlds of art and architectural journalism.

In the closing decades of the twentieth century, however, juries began to include family members and community people who had some stake in the outcome. This was controversial at first. What could lay people with no inkling of the intricacies of design contribute to the process? On the

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