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Kengo Kuma mysteriously replaces Marlon Blackwell to lead design for the Global War on Terrorism Memorial

2024-10-01T13:13:00-04:00

Kengo Kuma has just been named as the lead architect for the forthcoming Global War on Terrorism Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

Stating that his passion for the work stems from the loss of a personal friend on September 11th, Kuma said: "This Memorial will help the entire world contemplate the war of global significance that has followed that day of sorrow and the experiences of those who have participated in it."

The wartime experience of roughly 2.7 million American servicemembers who took part in the conflict since 2001 will indeed play a role, along with a consideration of the war’s impact on the broader society in whose name it was administered. According to a survey of 20,000 veterans and civilians from all 50 states performed by organizers at the Global War on Terrorism Memorial Foundation, the following elements were preferred by a majority (80%) of respondents:

More than 60% of respondents wanted green space around the Memorial, and 50% of respondents hop...

Studio Libeskind unveils preliminary design for Tree of Life synagogue shooting memorial in Pittsburgh

2023-12-08T15:16:00-05:00

Preliminary designs for Studio Libeskind’s long-awaited 10/27 Memorial at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh have officially been announced following a sensitive design consultation with families of the victims of the tragic 2018 mass shooting that left eleven worshipers dead and six more injured.

“The journey to unveiling the preliminary memorial designs has been a long and emotional one, but I am grateful for a process that prioritized our hopes that our loved ones are remembered for how they lived, not solely for how they were murdered,” said Diane Rosenthal, a member of the Memorialization Working Group who lost two siblings in the attack, which stands as the deadliest antisemitic hate incident in American history.

A March 2022 rendering of the Tree of Life project depicting the expanded building. Image: Studio Libeskind

The group, which represents all three congregations included within the 70-year-old synagogue, was also able to visit the memorial to passengers of Flight ...

The Mellon Foundation's Monuments Project expands with $500 million commitment

2023-11-28T14:27:00-05:00

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation’s influential Monuments Project is about to expand its reach thanks to a newly-announced commitment of $500 million to the now three-year-old initiative that has to date provided 80 projects worth a total of $170 million nationwide.

The amount effectively doubles the available resources from the original $250 million pool that was established at the outset. Reformers targeting America’s “commemorative landscape” have to date provided superlative examples of how to best repair the nation’s psychic wounds, including the forthcoming Memorial to the 1871 Chinese Massacre in Los Angeles and the recent Beyond Granite exhibition for the National Mall in Washington.

The money represents the Mellon Foundation’s largest-ever financial commitment and will be put towards further recognition of the contributions different marginalized groups have made to the United States from the Colonial era on.

Related on Archinect: The Mellon Foundation's Monuments Project aw...

Davidson College unveils plans for a new memorial to enslaved and exploited people, led by Hank Willis Thomas and Perkins&Will

2023-06-01T12:17:00-04:00

Davidson College has unveiled its plans for a new memorial to the enslaved and exploited people whose hands built the 186-year-old liberal arts institution. The design effort of the sculpture titled “With These Hands: A Memorial to the Enslaved and Exploited” will be led by Perkins&Will in collaboration with Hank Willis Thomas.

The artist of Boston's new commemoration of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King will deliver a similar monumental bronze sculpture that emerges prominently from a refuge-like space nearby the campus’s original Oak and Elm buildings.

Thomas was selected for the commission following a two-year search process led by alumni that reflects similar reconciliation efforts at Brown University, The College of William & Mary, UNC Chapel Hill, and perhaps most notably, the Höweler+Yoon project at the University of Virginia spearheaded by alumna Mabel O. Wilson.

MASS Design Group's touching Hank Willis Thomas MLK memorial commission debuts in Boston

2023-01-17T15:57:00-05:00

The wait for artist Hank Willis Thomas and MASS Design Group’s public memorial to Martin Luther King on the Boston Common finally ended over the weekend with a ribbon-cutting ceremony that included the sculpture's design team and a host of local political dignitaries.

They were on hand to witness the unveiling of Thomas’ monumental The Embrace sculpture that now sits at the southern edge of America’s oldest public park in the newly-created 1965 Freedom Plaza, a short distance away from the 236-year-old statehouse and Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ memorial to the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment. By rights, putting the legacy of its subjects in proper place alongside the Hub’s other paragons of social justice causes from centuries past.

Image courtesy MASS Design Group

Dr. King met his wife, the late Coretta Scott King, at Boston University’s Myles Standish Hall while the two were both graduate students at different institutions in early 1952. Thomas wanted to create a lasting monumen...

A decade after the tragedy, SWA Group unveils memorial to Sandy Hook victims as a center of reflection

2022-11-14T15:23:00-05:00

Ten years removed from the tragic shooting that claimed the lives of 27 school children and teachers in Newtown, Connecticut, SWA Group has today officially unveiled a permanent memorial to the victims, called The Clearing, that will seek to heal the community, survivors, and family members still in search of justice in their tight-knit New England town.

Located on a five-acre parcel of donated land near the replacement for the now demolished former elementary school, the design for the memorial keys on three elements integrated into interconnected paths that bring visitors through a circuitry of woodlands, meadows, and a water feature intended to “honor the process of grieving and remembrance.”

Photo: Neil Landino

SWA says: “The Sandy Hook Memorial differs from other memorials in that it was publicly funded and completely community-led. It is also primarily landscape rather than a monument. Memorials are typically embedded in landscape rather than having landscape as the focus. The ...