In the "Monumental Reimagining" studio, you're about to embark on an exciting journey where we'll rethink the monuments in our community. We'll dive into the history and controversies surrounding them, and together, we'll imagine a future where our monuments truly represent our past, present, and future. 

Picture this: your town hall has given you the important job of designing a monument that tells untold stories, celebrates our community's values, and honors our history. You're the young and bright designer leading the way, and the responsibility is all yours to create a monument that brings hidden narratives to light.

You'll have the freedom to choose whether your monument will be interactive or something you observe, and you can experiment with various materials and tools to take your monument design to a whole new level. Your final creation will be your innovative monument, and you'll explain the story it tells and the creative choices you've made. In the "Monumental Reimagining" studio, you'll be at the forefront of transforming the way our community's history and values are commemorated. Your fresh perspective as a young architect will inspire change and help us build a more inclusive and forward-looking future for our community's monuments. Get ready to let your creativity soar and make your mark on our cultural landscape! 

Your final deliverables will be:

• physical models (sketch model iterations)
• a rendered model (Rhino and Photoshop)
• a concept statement

Software: Rhino, Photoshop

Prompt

You will embark on a journey to understand and challenge the way historical events are memorialized in your town. You will draw inspiration from counter monuments worldwide that have transformed memorials to more accurately represent history. 

Purpose: 

This counter monuments activity empowers you to critically engage with the way history is represented in your town and encourages you to be an agent of change by proposing meaningful counter monument interventions. It's an opportunity to challenge and reshape historical narratives through art and design. 

Duration: ~2 hrs

Materials: computer or tablet, paper, pencils, optional lo-fi materials

Instructions:

Step 1: Exploring Counter Monuments (Slideshow):

• Begin by reading through a slideshow that showcases various counter monuments from around the world. These counter monuments challenge traditional memorials and highlight the importance of accurate representation in historical narratives.

Step 2: Identifying Historical Misrepresentations:

• Examine monuments or historical landmarks in your town that you believe inaccurately memorialize history. Consider those that may perpetuate myths, downplay injustices, or misrepresent events or figures.

Step 3: Proposing Counter Monument Iterations:

• Choose a monument or historical landmark from your town that you would like to transform into a counter monument. Consider the following steps for each chosen site:
  • Actual Monument Image: Include an image of the existing monument that you want to modify or reimagine.
  • Intervention Sketch: Create a sketch or visual representation of your proposed intervention or transformation. Consider how you can make the memorial more accurate, inclusive, or reflective of history.
  • Optional Sketch Model: If you have time, develop a small-scale model of your counter monument intervention to provide a tangible representation of your vision.

Step 4: Reflect and Share:

• Reflect on your proposed counter monument interventions and their significance. Share your ideas and the reasoning behind your choices with your peers and the class.

Deliverable:

• Your final presentation should consist of a set of slides, each focusing on a specific monument or historical landmark. Each slide should include:
  • An image of the actual monument.
  • An intervention sketch depicting your proposed transformation.
  • Optional: A sketch model to visually represent your vision.

Objective: Engage in a collaborative brainstorming session to generate ideas for a community monument that reflects the values, memories, and stories of your community. 

Duration: ~2-3 hrs

Materials: 

Post-it notes, whiteboard, Markers, Sketching materials

Brainstorming Chart!

Use the slides to guide you through the steps

Step 1:

You will begin by adding to a chart drawn on the wall or white board. Use post-it notes and write as many as you can.

Step 2:

Select a few post-it notes that inspire you from the chart. 

Return to your seat and sketch potential monument ideas that represent the selected concepts, memories, or stories. 

Go back to the chart and stick your sketches next to the corresponding post-it notes.

Step 3:

Your teacher will start assigning groups based on similar interests. These groups or partnerships will be the students you will work with for the rest of this studio.

Reflect on the following questions with your group/partner:

• How are your ideas similar or different?
• Which would you like to pursue further? 
• Did someone else have an idea you might be interested in?
• What are your next steps?

Together, sketch 3-5 of your consolidated ideas!

Deliverables: 

Take pictures and scans of your ideas, starting at post-its to sketches all the way to your consolidated group sketches. 

Post on the Response Tab.

Brainstorming can be a great way to generate ideas.  

Think about how your monument would make a valuable contribution to your community and what form it might take (just a loose idea is fine at this stage). Remember that the form of the monument is up to you. It could be permanent or temporary; made with long-lasting materials or ones that will biodegrade. We encourage you to be creative! 

Brainstorming Tips

1. Wild ideas lead to creativity: do not filter anything out at this stage, even if it doesn't seem "practical" or "possible." Keep an open mind - ideas can become more specific and feasible as we develop them further. At this stage, anything is possible.

2. Aim for as many ideas as possible: whatever comes to mind, get it down on paper or typed into a meaningful document - make sure you're creating a record of what you're thinking. These thoughts can be words, visuals, ideas, images, materials, objects, places - at this stage, it doesn't matter.

3. Inspiration can come from anywhere: look around your home, your school, and your neighborhood for inspiration. Explore any designs, artworks, sculptures, and installations that come to mind, and record the maker/designer/artist if possible. This helps build your knowledge of the world of art, design, and monumental architecture and allows you to talk more knowledgeably about your work and research.

Introduction

When you imagine a monument, what comes to mind? Do you picture a sculpture? A building? A pyramid? Is there a monument in your own community that comes to mind?

Monuments can take many forms and have many purposes. They can honor or commemorate people, events, moments in history or community values. They can be designed to last for centuries or for a specific moment in time.

In this section, you'll take a look at examples of different forms monuments can take, different purposes they can serve and different responses and reactions they can inspire or provoke by walking virtually around your town and exploring some more around the world.

Materials: computer or tablet

Duration: ~2 hrs

Instructions:

1. Follow the slideshow to have a step by step analysis of choosing monuments that you are interested in. 

2. Then, choose three monuments in your town and take a screenshot of it (make sure you have a good view) and three monuments from the tabs "Monument Precedents" and "Experimental Monuments Precedents".

3. In a slide show (6 slides total), make sure to include the answers to the questions:

- History: Why was it built

- Present: How does it impact the now?

- Intervention: Would you change anything to it?

Deliverables:

Post this slideshow in the Response Tab

Latin American architecture firm Gómez Platero has unveiled a design for a circular monument in Uruguay to remember coronavirus victims.

The proposed World Memorial to the Pandemic is a large sculpture designed to be installed on water off the coast of Uruguay.

Learn more about the proposed sculpture here.

Learn about other, innovative ways in which victims of this and this and other pandemics have been commemorated here.

The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, also known as the Holocaust Memorial, is a memorial in Berlin to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, designed by architect Peter Eisenman. It consists 2,711 concrete slabs or "stelae", arranged in a grid pattern, with cobbled walkways between them.

Eisenman himself wrote that the stelae are designed to produce an uneasy, confusing atmosphere, and the whole sculpture seeks to represent an ordered system that has lost touch with human reason.  The monument has been controversial, with some people feeling it is too impersonal (it has no inscriptions of victims' names, for instance), and others being critical that it only commemorates Jewish victims of Nazi persecution and not others.  In its first year, swastikas (Nazi symbols) were painted on the stelae on five occasions.

Learn more about the Berlin Holocaust Memorial here.  

Related Reading: Learn more about "Yolocaust" - a term coined for the questionable behaviours of some visitors at this memorial and others. 

The Memorial to Enslaved Laborers at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville commemorates 4,000 enslaved men, women and children who were involved in building or maintaining the university during its first 40 years.  The design team held meetings with the community to consult with them on the location and design of the monument.  The result is a walled circle of stone nestling in the earth, inscribed with names of known individuals who were enslaved, as well as blank lines for names that research has yet to reveal.  After a rain shower, water that has collected in the inscriptions runs down the stone wall like tears.

Read more on the Memorial here.  

The Commando Memorial is a Category A listed monument in Lochaber, Scotland, dedicated to the men of the original British Commando Forces raised during World War II. Situated around a mile from Spean Bridge, it overlooks the training areas of the Commando Training Depot established in 1942 at Achnacarry Castle. Unveiled in 1952 by the Queen Mother, it is one of Scotland’s best-known monuments, both as a war memorial and as a tourist attraction offering views of Ben Nevis and Aonach Mòr.

Learn more about the Commando Memorial here. 

"Places of Remembrance is a memorial in Berlin-Schoeneberg in a neighborhood called the Bayerische Viertel created in remembrance of Jews living in Germany during the Third Reich. In June 1993, the artists Renata Stih & Frieder Schnock put up 80 brightly printed signs on lampposts."

The signs created by the artists feature bold images coupled with real rules and regulations designed to strip away freedom from Jewish people in Berlin. This artwork is a kind of decentralized memorial as the signs are located throughout the Bayerische Viertel neighborhood.  

Learn more about Places of Remembrance here. 

"A group in New York City has been installing bikes painted white at the sites of accidents where cyclists were killed...

In 2005, a member of the collective witnessed the immediate aftermath of a crash, and thought the group had to do something. 'We all felt it was our responsibility,' Singer said.

The idea of setting up a ghost bike was taken from a project in St. Louis, Missouri. These projects have since spread to over 200 locations around the world, including Austria, New Zealand, Cyprus, and Singapore.

It was jarring and emotional. It was planned as a one-time thing. Then just a week after the first ghost bike was set up, another cyclist was killed on the road, Singer said—and then another."

Learn more here.