Art, Monument, and Memory: An Introduction

Abstract

People visit historic sites, museum exhibits, and commemorative objects and places because they are tangible representations of historic events. Individuals, internally defined groups, and communities of all sizes form culturally meaningful connections to these sites through the process of ‘‘monument building’’—the creation of concrete and abstract, tangible and intangible creative, artistic works. These artistic works in turn purposefully function to perpetuate the memory and ascribed meaning of a site, and the events that took place there and/or the people with whom they associate it. They also function to fix particular interpretations of the site—whether an associated event was good or bad, moral or amoral, ethical or unethical—particular truths, based in evidence or not, that are important to the artist or commissioners of the work. That this can be contentious is evident, and this contentiousness can be amplified when the sites in question are those associated with traumatic events such as military battles and shipwrecks.