Notes on Public Memory in Public Spaces

-What monuments are and they could be.
-Monuments: Public memory, shared values and shared experiences.
-"By common consent, the postmodern age is obsessed with memory" -Daniel Sherman, The Construction of Memory in Interwar France
-Recognizable naming of object. Pen for example, different connotations of what a pen would be.
-Monuments like written records, anything that serves to commemorate something in particular, like an event or era of the past.
-A history of the past.
-Passing on the memory with the use of the monument. For example, graffiti.
-Characteristics of monuments: Scale, Permanence (Vietnam Wall in D.C., the rise and falling of war) bridges time & place, prominence, creates context & reference.
-The location of prominence.
-AIDS quilt, not built in its entirety, not permanent because it's made of fabric, serves as a warning. A counter-monument.
-Free Speech Monument
-Reason why monuments fail is because they are not refolded in everyday life or in every individual, ritual, celebration.
-St. Louis Arch
-Mt. Davidson Cross, San Francisco (monuments can originally be erected or installed for a particular purpose, but can be refilled for a different purpose.)