Monuments is a collection of illustrated, nonfiction narratives about American memorials that examines the reasons—political, psychological, and emotional—for building them. Included are classic American landmarks, such as the Lincoln Memorial and Mount Rushmore, and also unconventional monuments that are changing the way we think about commemoration—the AIDS Quilt, a traveling memorial made for the people by the people, and the haunting lyrics of Bruce Springsteen’s “Empty Sky,” an intangible remembrance of September 11. The book’s cover is deeply sculpted to evoke carved stone and the tactile experience of running one’s fingertips over a memorial—the most ancient and enduring form of homage. Random House, 272 pages, 250 duotone photographs, $45. Click for reviews and author appearances.
What a joy to attend the Inaugural.The frigid cold instantly gave everyone something in common–staying warm–and conspired with Obama’s message: We were one, and how! Everyone in that ocean of humanity knew that the stranger pressed up against us was a source of warmth. I’d say it was a good start.
Seeing the Mall fully activated, fully full, democratically so, tearful and hopeful, was an inspiration. The meaning of the Mall’s monuments, those enduring symbols of the nation’s aspirations, sacrifice, and hope for change, was renewed during these last several days–it was great to see them in action.
Given Obama’s interest in architecture, let’s hope that he illuminates the profound connection that exists between our quality of life and the places we inhabit. Here’s a brief recap of presidential architectural forays written by David Brussat for the Providence Journal. Aside from his comments about Daniel Libeskind (Dave and I have agreed to disagree on some contemporary structures), this is a fascinating read.
“BARACK OBAMA spilled the beans at a campaign rally last March 21, in Salem, Ore.: “I can tell you that when I was young I wanted to be an architect, but, um, I . . . [shout from offstage] . . . That was good! Architect of change! I like that!”
If only Obama had not been interrupted by that blockhead, we might know what sort of architect he would have been. Maybe, if we are really lucky and Obama really is smart, we can have not only change we can believe in but change we can see.
Today, many Americans are dissatisfied with their built environment. Obama must try to change architecture from the modernism of the past half a century to a new traditionalism for the future. Is he likely to do so? The tea leaves give us few clues. Read More »
Author Michael Chabon, a member of Obama’s Arts Policy Committee, describes the critical importance of the arts at this moment in our nation’s history:
“Every grand American accomplishment, every innovation that has benefited and enriched our lives, every lasting social transformation, every moment of profound insight any American visionary ever had into a way
Inspirational speaker Nicole Johnson uses my book, Churches, to deliver a powerful message of hope for women who feel invisible and taken for granted. I don’t know Nicole, but what she took away from Churches and how she brought the lessons of the Gothic cathedral builders to bear on today’s problems, blew me away.Watch, and be inspired!For more on Nicole, visit Fresh Brewed Life, hope for the daily grind.
Building a bridge is a monumental undertaking, and there is something inherent in projects of this size and scope that makes people want to participate in their creation. In the case of the sleek, new I-35W crossing over the Mississippi that opened in Minneapolis this week, Twin City residents engaged in a day-long discussion that determined aspects of the bridge’s design, eighteen hundred schoolchildren made mosaic tiles that adorn the bridge, and thousands watched in wonder as this heroic ten-lane highway bridge rose, incredibly, in eleven short months. To celebrate the bridge and spirit of collaboration, FIGG, the bridge’s designer and engineer of record, has published Bridging the Mississippi: The New I-35W Bridge. Rich with color photos, plans, and graphics, the book provides a step-by-step overview for the general reader of the bridge’s design, planning, and construction. All book proceeds will be donated to two Minneapolis organizations that further the cause of education. For more information, and to order the book ($20 plus shipping), visit FIGG.
One of the thrills of the writing life is receiving pictures of one’s “babies” taken in faraway places. Bill Pinkney, the visionary behind the recreation of the Amistad schooner as a floating, living memorial to civil rights, presented a copy of Monuments, which tells Amistad’s story, to Josephine Kargbo of the Monuments and Relics Commission of Sierra Leone during the Amistad’s 2007-2008 Atlantic Freedom Tour. This historic 18-month journey retraced the slave trade route to
A third-generation stone carver and calligrapher, Nick Benson (b. 1964) creates elegant hand-carved tombstones and architectural lettering for public buildings, memorials, and monuments. He owns and operates the John Stevens Shop, a historic stone carving establishment in Newport, Rhode Island. The shop was run by eight generations of Stevenses until 1927 when it was purchased by Benson’s grandfather, John Howard Benson (1901-1956), a distinguished calligrapher, sculptor, author, and teacher, who was at the forefront of the renaissance in American stone carving between the wars. Benson learned his craft from his father John Everett Benson (b. 1939), a renowned letter carver who has left his mark on such national treasures as the John F. Kennedy Memorial, the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial, and the National Gallery of Art. A master in his own right, Nick Benson was commissioned in 2000 to design and carve the inscriptions for the National World War II Memorial on the Mall in Washington, DC which will be dedicated in May 2004.
Note: The complete interview with Nick Benson appears in Monuments: Life in Memory.
JD: How much stone cutting did the World War II Memorial involve?
NB: There are 4,682 letters in total—a lot of lettering—in twenty-two inscription locations. The letters vary in size from three-quarters of an inch tall to more than 19 inches.
JD: What kind of granite was used?
NB: It’s a North Carolina granite called Kershaw. One of the reasons [memorial designer] Friedrich St. Florian chose it is because it has an incredibly large grain. Even from a distance, you can see the character of the granite. Finer granite, especially with such large, bold architectural forms, would get lost. Read More »
From a distance it looks like a futuristic schooner, sails aloft, barely skimming the surface of the water as it crosses Tampa Bay. Compared as well to the strings of a harp or an open fan, the triangular plane of stays that support the sleek Sunshine Skyway Bridge are, however described, a triumph of engineering design. Though not a new way of spanning the seas, (cable-stayed bridges, relatively inexpensive and easily mounted on the piers of destroyed bridges, first gained popularity in post-World War II Germany), the Sunshine Skyway Bridge combines state-of-the-art engineering with a striking design that heralds the aesthetic possibilities of the cable-stayed bridge. Read More »
Given how old I was feeling on my 42nd birthday, it was probably a mistake spending the day sorting through my son Emmet’s baby clothes, three bags full or, as he once sang the nursery rhyme, three bag fool. I was a three-bag fool all right, crying from the outset of this unavoidable rite of maternal passage.
The sentimental favorites were still scented with the perfumed paper that once lined his bureau drawers. There was a soft hat embroidered with a heart, his first gift, which was impossibly small and strangely alien to this first-time mother. Oh, it occurred to me, this thinglet inside will need clothes. There was another hat, a jaunty cobalt blue and yellow number, that Emmet wore on a walk one day in autumn, the glorious season of his birth. A fire-red leaf dropped into his carriage, alit on the blue hat, and created an effortless, sublime work of art. I’ve kept it for the memory of that moment. And then there is a little green sweater, the most precious item of all.
One Soldier’s Story is about my childhood neighbor, Rickey Caruolo, who was one of the first to die in the Vietnam War. It is a snapshot of a more innocent time in America and an intimate portrait of one soldier who stands in for all the great guys killed in Vietnam. Those who visit the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, known simply as the Wall, go because they had a Rick, Joe, or Steve whom they loved and lost. They go to the Wall because the most precious thing they own is the letter like the one Wayne Burwell wrote to the Caruolo family after their son died in his arms. This essay acknowledges that, and the reality that the most moving monuments are not necessarily those that are eventually constructed in stone.
On summer nights, my older, next-door neighbor Rickey Caruolo would play the guitar on his front steps. He always drew a crowd—women who were mesmerized by his movie-star good looks, his football buddies from Mount Pleasant High, old timers, and children, lots of them. Fifty-two children lived on Lennon Street, and the undisputed god of that street was Rickey. Lennon was a street of families, each contributing four, five, six boomers to the tumble, the backbone of the American dream, fifties style.
Everyone had two parents and a dog. There were endless days of four-square, red rover, and hide-and-go-seek. It was a moveable feast: if someone wasn’t home, you simply found someone to play with at the next house.
We swam in the summer, burned leaves in the fall, starred in Mr. Nickerson’s Halloween movies, sang carols in the long winter night before the annual Christmas party at the Dionne’s house—all of us, every season, every year. Even the dogs played together.
After reading Thomas Merton’s Seven Storey Mountain while an art student at Brooklyn’s Pratt Institute, John Giuliani’s life changed. He put down his paintbrush, entered the seminary, and served as a diocesan priest for two decades. Inflamed with the desire to communicate the dignity of all persons, especially those whom society has marginalized, he began painting again in 1989. His meticulous acrylic-on-gesso panel paintings of Christian saints in the image of Native Americans marry the mysticism of traditional iconography with the sensuality of the Italian Renaissance, and, in their depiction of indigenous peoples, transcend both genres.
His paintings are displayed in churches throughout the United States, many of them on Native American reservations. In 2003, a retrospective exhibition of his work was held at the Institute of Sacred Music at Yale University. Father John lives at the Benedictine Grange, a monastic community in rural Connecticut, which he founded in 1977. I spoke with Father John at the Grange in July 2004. Read More »
Monuments is a collection of illustrated, nonfiction narratives about American memorials that examines the reasons—political, psychological, and emotional—for building them. Included are classic American landmarks, such as the Lincoln Memorial and Mount Rushmore, and also unconventional monuments that are changing the way we think about commemoration—the AIDS Quilt, a traveling memorial made for the people by the people, and the haunting lyrics of Bruce Springsteen’s “Empty Sky,” an intangible remembrance of September 11. The book’s cover is deeply sculpted to evoke carved stone and the tactile experience of running one’s fingertips over a memorial—the most ancient and enduring form of homage. Random House, 272 pages, 250 duotone photographs, $45. Click for 
What a joy to attend the Inaugural. The frigid cold instantly gave everyone something in common–staying warm–and conspired with Obama’s message: We were one, and how! Everyone in that ocean of humanity knew that the stranger pressed up against us was a source of warmth. I’d say it was a good start.
From a distance it looks like a futuristic schooner, sails aloft, barely skimming the surface of the water as it crosses Tampa Bay. Compared as well to the strings of a harp or an open fan, the triangular plane of stays that support the sleek Sunshine Skyway Bridge are, however described, a triumph of engineering design. Though not a new way of spanning the seas, (cable-stayed bridges, relatively inexpensive and easily mounted on the piers of destroyed bridges, first gained popularity in post-World War II Germany), the Sunshine Skyway Bridge combines state-of-the-art engineering with a striking design that heralds the aesthetic possibilities of the cable-stayed bridge. 
Given how old I was feeling on my 42nd birthday, it was probably a mistake spending the day sorting through my son Emmet’s baby clothes, three bags full or, as he once sang the nursery rhyme, three bag fool. I was a three-bag fool all right, crying from the outset of this unavoidable rite of maternal passage.