A Historical Analysis
of
the
American
Monument
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The
Function
of
Public
Space
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- Place for civic rituals
- Political space where common cultural
values ideas are expressed
- The memorial is a key ingredient in the
symbolic expression of cultural ideals
The
Issue of Consensus
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- In a democracy, the consensus needed to endorse a
piece of public art is very problematic
- Rarely can all constituents ever be pleased
- This problem was not faced by other societies with
royalty, aristocrats or the church commissioning public
art
- Today, many past monuments are taken down or
renamed due to the presence of dissenting voices that
were not heard when the monuments were constructed
- In addition, monuments are static entities, but
memories or attitudes toward past events change
The
American Renaissance (1880-World War I)
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-Escalation of public projects, in turn, escalation of public
art
- Nearly all memorials commemorate figures of national
importance
- Emergence of civil war memorials
- The civil war provided a mythology of heroism, noble
leaders and foot soldiers
- The dominant style was classical
- Many American artists were trained abroad and were
indoctrinated into the classical style
The Puritan by
Augustus Saint Gaudens 1881
The Washington Monument
by Robert Mills 1885
The Minute Man
by Daniel Chester French 1871-75
Examples
of Various Civil War Memorials
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Robert E. Lee
J.E.B. Stuart
Stonewall Jackson
The
Source of the Equestrian Statue
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Marcus Aurelius
Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial Arch 1889-92
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The Source: The Triumphal Arch
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The Arch of Constantine
The End of the American Renaissance Early 1900s
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-A shift occurred from military memorials to the
commemoration of a “traditional”American way of life
-Private interests become major patrons, for example, groups like
The Daughters of the American Revolution, The Colonial Dames,
The Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities
- Such patrons feared new money, immigrants and new values
-Historical preservation and even creating replicas of what has
already been destroyed become the main ways to memorialize
the past
Williamsburg
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-A replica of a colonial town with careful editing
- Funded by Dr. W.A.R. Goodwin and John D. Rockefeller
Other examples of attempts to construct monuments
that serve as symbols of European ancestry
Leaning Tower of Pisa
in Niles, Illinois
The Parthenon in Nashville, TN
Stonehenge in Maryhill, Washington
Built by the railroad magnate
Sam Hill as an anti-war memorial
The Problem of the Modern Monument after World War II
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-The ambiguity surrounding which modern cultural ideals
to express or if any consensus surrounding cultural
values exists or ever has??
-The classical style of past monuments was and still is
treated with skepticism
- For example, the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial
Commission in 1955 called for “a less dominant form
than the Lincoln, Jefferson and Washington monuments”
-Due to controversy, the FDR memorial was not completed
until 1997
The Presence of the Anti-Monument
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Claes Oldenburg
- sees common cultural values existing in mundane objects
and consumer desires not national heroes or ideals
which are the focus of the traditional monument
The Presence of the Anti-Monument
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The Presence of the Anti-Monument
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The Presence of the Anti-Monument
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The Presence of the Anti-Monument
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The Presence of the Anti-Monument
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The anti-fascist disappearing monument by Jochen & Esther
Gerz in Hamburg, Germany
It was unveiled in 1986 and
vanished in 1993.
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The new language or style of the modern monument??
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It appears that Minimalism has emerged as an acceptable
alternative to classicism.
For example . . .
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial
Oklahoma City Memorial
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