For the past decade, I’ve periodically followed the slow development of a memorial on the National Mall dedicated to veterans of the post-9/11 conflicts. I have two separate interests in this project, and they exist in tension.
First, I am a veteran of the Afghanistan War, so I feel something of a personal stake in this monument. I served on active duty as a C-17 loadmaster from 2011 to 2015 and spent an additional three years in the reserves. My time in the military is not displayed on my sleeve in any literal or figurative sense. Although it was not all that long ago, that period of my life feels increasingly distant. Perhaps it is a bit selfish, but I would love to see a prominent monument that allows veterans and non-veterans alike to connect over a series of messy, unpopular wars.
Second, I take a disheartened interest in modern architecture and urban design. From the federal level to the smallest of towns, America used to build beautiful parks, government buildings, civic spaces, and public art. But over the last half century or so, these art forms have increasingly become predictable, dehumanizing, and abstract exercises, often to the point of incomprehension.
When I learned earlier this week that the preliminary designs for the post-9/11 memorial were being released, I waited eagerly but nervously.
As I anticipated, the design is an absolute letdown.
I encourage everyone to make up their own minds by viewing the announcement video and accompanying website.
The most serious issue is also the most obvious: if someone did not tell you this was a memorial to the post-9/11 conflicts, would you know that simply by looking at it? If you are anything like me, the answer is a resounding no.
Such memorials do not need to plainly announce what they are, but they should be accessible to the public, veterans and non-veterans alike, whom they are supposed to represent. If you think of the great monuments and memorials in Washington and beyond, it does not take a discerning eye to understand what they commemorate.
A stunningly beautiful recent example is the World War I Memorial. Anyone with a passing understanding of our nation’s history can see the connection to the conflict it memorializes. For those who wish to go deeper, there are plenty of hints, clues, and abstractions that bring real depth to the work.
Next, the proposed memorial lacks a human touch. This is not necessarily a fatal flaw in and of itself. The World War II Memorial is not particularly human-centric, yet it remains beautiful in its grandeur and embrace of American architectural traditions. But many of our best memorials—from the previously mentioned World War I Memorial, to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, to the statues of the Korean War Veterans Memorial—place the human experience of war at their center.
The post-9/11 memorial currently under development gestures in this direction, with footprints representing the weight of war, recovered materials from the 9/11 attacks incorporated into its construction, and an orientation that visually links the site to the burial place of many post-9/11 veterans in Arlington National Cemetery. But these are just that: gestures.
The footprints, while a nice thought, encapsulate another issue. The memorial too readily embraces contemporary notions of art and design. Footprints impressed into modern construction materials such as concrete are forms of urban street art at best, or a mild form of graffiti at worst. To further illustrate the problem, they possess an almost childish quality that would be better suited for a school of design than on the National Mall.
One of the sculptures belonging to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial drives this point home. Three soldiers, standing shoulder to shoulder, appear exhausted yet at peace among themselves as they bear the weight of their equipment and the tropical heat of Vietnam. The image is stirring. It clearly communicates its meaning without becoming overly didactic or abstract.
And a sense of abstraction and sameness is ultimately the proposed memorial’s fundamental weakness. If you showed me the artist renderings of the memorial without the American flag and told me it was some recently completed public park in Berlin, I would have believed you. Abstract art has become universal and predictable, rendering it void of any meaning or sense of time and place.
But the veterans who served in the post-9/11 conflicts came from real places across our country, and the sacrifices they made, and the places where they made them, were not abstractions. They were real, visceral, and human. The wars they fought were ugly, unpopular, and reached muddled outcomes, but a human beauty that can only be born from struggle and love for brothers and sisters in arms nonetheless came out of them. They deserve a memorial that reflects that, and so much more.