Boston Bombing Memorial | Boylston St | Back Bay

stick n move

stick n move

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“BOSTON —
A memorial to remember victims of the Boston Marathon bombings has been well over a year in the making.

Eighteen-foot light columns that have been meticulously designed are encased in molten bronze, and every aspect of the $2 million memorial has thoughtful symbolism behind it.

The columns are meant to represent how Boston’s strength protects the fragility of life.

There will also be three stone pillars as part of the memorial to represent the lives that were lost.”

https://www.wbaltv.com/article/memorial-for-boston-marathon-bombing-will-include-thoughtful-symbols-of-strength/26977693
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.necn.com/multimedia/Boston-Marathon-Bombing-Memorial-Boylston-Street-Renderings-483708041.html%3Famp%3Dy

There are 2 memorials, one at each bombing site. If you look close you can see both. Coming summer 19’.








This site has 1 stone pillar for the life lost at this spot


This site has 2 stone pillars for the 2 lives lost at this spot




“A bronze brick at each memorial will feature a police badge: one belonging to MIT Officer Sean Collier and one belonging to Boston police Sgt. Dennis Simmonds. Shown here are wax models and the two badges.”
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“Two of the granite sculptures that will be part of the Boston Marathon bombing memorial.”
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“Pablo Eduardo, the artist for the Boston Marathon finish line memorial, left, seen here with one of the light towers that will rise on Boylston Street this summer.”
 
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Re: Boston Bombing Memorial | Boylston st | Back Bay

Meticulously crafted, maybe. But nothing about this connects me to the event it's supposed to commemorate. It looks like any other bit of street art, without a plaque or knowing the location can anyone really look at this and know that it's a memorial?

And that's leaving aside my own aesthetic distaste for what I'm seeing. This, to me, is very weak work design-wise. No disrespect to the craftpeople, they're obviously working really hard in the link and are quite skilled.
 
Im going to hold off judgement until I am able to see it in person and then depending on the feelings I get from that interaction Ill judge it from there. With something meant to make you reflect on tough emotions you had around that event, viewing it as a render on ur phone just doesnt show you how youll feel and if its a success or not. You have to experience these things in person. The Vietnam memorial would not be able to convey the feelings you get when you see it in person either from renders. You just never know ahead of time with things like this.
 
Yes I hope it includes a plaque. It's hard to see from the renders.
 
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I think that it's important to keep in mind that these memorials were designed with careful and significant insight from the victims' families. While they are not the only people affected by that day, they've made it clear in the press that they're pleased with these projects, and I'd argue that's what matters most.
 
Re: Boston Bombing Memorial | Boylston st | Back Bay

cadetcarl said:
It looks like any other bit of street art, without a plaque or knowing the location can anyone really look at this and know that it's a memorial?
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I believe that "looks like art, can't tell it's a memorial until you give it some thought" is a feature, not a bug. Subtlety is a virtue. That's why the Vietnam Memorial in DC, for example, is so great.

An in-your-face "BOMBS WENT OFF HERE" memorial on Boylston would be tacky, out of scale, and inappropriate. I love the renders and am excited for the final product.
 
That is waaaaay too esoteric. I'm glad to have read the description, because these things look like tendrils constraining the light...which is probably not the message they'd hope to convey. And having read the description, I still don't get it.

Martin's Park in the Seaport is a much better tribute.

The Vietnam Memorial is successful because of it's ability to stir emotion and introspection to anyone regardless of their interest or knowledge of art. The journey is sad and moving, but the end is uplifting. You emerge back into the light, so to speak. I'm not convinced these magic wands on Boylston will have the same impact...but in fairness, I also haven't seen them in person.
 
The most emotional memorial I've ever been to is the 9/11 memorial in NYC. They did a great job with that, and conveying the enormous scale of the buildings and the people who were killed.
 
Re: Boston Bombing Memorial | Boylston st | Back Bay

JumboBuc said:
I believe that "looks like art, can't tell it's a memorial until you give it some thought" is a feature, not a bug. Subtlety is a virtue. That's why the Vietnam Memorial in DC, for example, is so great.

An in-your-face "BOMBS WENT OFF HERE" memorial on Boylston would be tacky, out of scale, and inappropriate. I love the renders and am excited for the final product.
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Agreed. Them working with the victims families is important and I like that it has a light feature and just looks like art until you get close. Renders never convey the emotion you get in person so Ill hold off.

I agree though they EASILY could have just took the easy route shortcut and made a bronze statue of this..
166665581.jpeg


Instead they made 2 subtle art pieces that take interaction to connect to it so first impressions arent bad.
 
I should have been clear, I don't want a dumb bronze statue that doesn't force the viewer to think anything besides "duhhh all cops are heroes" or whatever. I'm appreciative of subtlety; this is nowhere near as thoughtful as the Vietnam memorial or, for example, the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin. The poetry of descending along that wall, or walking among those monoliths, is not matched by anything I'm seeing here. Our own holocaust memorial blows this out of the water.

It's probably too much to ask for but there are a lot of things I associate with that event: the runners, the crowd, the fact that the perpetrators lived and worked here among us, the way the city rallied together, etc. Those things are so specific and maybe, maybe, I can grant that the ribbons on the light towers are supposed to evoke the ties that bind us or something similar.

And I will go see it when it's built so I'm not just talking out the side of my neck but I wish it were more specific than this, and more poetic. But I'm just some guy, and as mentioned above, if the families like it then that's what we're getting.
 
I know, trust me I wasnt suggesting you did. Im just saying it easily could have been that and Im glad its not.
 
Mixed thoughts on this...but I do look forward to it's addition to Boylston Street. We no longer do equestrian statues or Gothic water fountains, so esoteric it has to be. And it's more than a stone bench with inscribed names, which is the usual civic token.

I know this is important for the collective city and direct victims to continue to heal, but like 9/11 Memorial, why do we feel such immediate need to memorialize tragic events today? Am I alone in this thought? No sooner had the dust left lower Manhattan, the race to memorialize began. There are other higher casualty events in the city where we've not done more than a plaque in the sidewalk - the Molasses Flood and Cocoanut Grove Fire being the most obvious. The look on my grandmothers face when she lost 2 siblings to that fire and knew many more families impacted, and the bombing memorial was announced. There are shootings and fires daily...life goes on.

Glad to see Sgt. Simmonds not being lost in the story of what happened. That actually made me feel less indifferent to this.
 
Bos77 said:
Mixed thoughts on this...but I do look forward to it's addition to Boylston Street. We no longer do equestrian statues or Gothic water fountains, so esoteric it has to be. And it's more than a stone bench with inscribed names, which is the usual civic token.

I know this is important for the collective city and direct victims to continue to heal, but like 9/11 Memorial, why do we feel such immediate need to memorialize tragic events today? Am I alone in this thought? No sooner had the dust left lower Manhattan, the race to memorialize began. There are other higher casualty events in the city where we've not done more than a plaque in the sidewalk - the Molasses Flood and Cocoanut Grove Fire being the most obvious. The look on my grandmothers face when she lost 2 siblings to that fire and knew many more families impacted, and the bombing memorial was announced. There are shootings and fires daily...life goes on.

Glad to see Sgt. Simmonds not being lost in the story of what happened. That actually made me feel less indifferent to this.
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Your instincts are 100% correct. We memorialize everything these days, and we do it immediately. It’s because as a society we have lost patience and appreciation for what the passage of time can accomplish and heal… We have no ability to look internally, and instead always rush to externalize anything even slightly distressing. We have lost faith in our own ability as a society to decide what is important, and instead rely on hierarchical organization is to tell us what’s important, what needs to be remembered, etc. The things that really matter get remembered with or without memorials and this is how we determine, eventually, what really necessities a memorial to anything. This may sound harsh, but it’s my opinion: I don’t think there should be any memorial at all, and I think in 50 years or more, we could place a plaque somewhere in Copley.

There is simply neither room nor time to memorialize everything. Had society been so romantic and sentimental prior to the 19th century (when the general movement began), nothing would have gotten done, we would’ve preserved everything and nothing new, and the world would be clogged with reminders of every tragic event that ever happened.
 
Also, in re to be proposal itself: at least it’s small and subtle, which is a good thing. But why the emphasis on law enforcement? Dozens of civilians lost limbs and have been permanently impacted. One officer died and another died a whole year later (calling to mind another argument on how we now rack up the death toll on tragedy to include events that occur long after the tragedy itself). I don’t like the fact that there’s police badges at all; Sean Collier should be mentioned in Cambridge (and I think he is), and this as proposed appears to emphasize police over civilians. The tragedy affected everyone; I don’t think we should get hung up on names at all and I definitely don’t think just because 1-2 victims were police they should get extra mention above and beyond the civilians who lost their lives.
 
The reason things like this are different than the molasses flood is because that was an accident and this was an attack. Thats just the way its always worked. Things like this, the New Zealand shooting are attacks on our way of life and theyre trying to make you not feel safe in your own community and actually change our way of life so thats why these tend to get more emphasis. Whether they should is a personal opinion, but thats why. I dont have a problem with them being memorialized. If it were a plaque thatd be fine, but since theyre already doing this that works too.
 
stick n move said:
The reason things like this are different than the molasses flood is because that was an accident and this was an attack. Thats just the way its always worked. Things like this, the New Zealand shooting are attacks on our way of life and theyre trying to make you not feel safe in your own community and actually change our way of life so thats why these tend to get more emphasis. Whether they should is a personal opinion, but thats why. I dont have a problem with them being memorialized. If it were a plaque thatd be fine, but since theyre already doing this that works too.
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We also trivialise it with movies and cheap retrospectives. Is anyone still buying a ‘Boston Strong’ T-shirt still being hawked at Quincy Market or Logan gift shops? Ask someone in Parkland or Newtown if their attacks were attack enough for a memorial. The latter one, is getting one, so I guess it is... so let’s say Thousand Oaks, Charleston, Pittsburgh, or Orlando instead. Is an attack that killed 5 in 2013 worse than negligence that killed 500 in 1942?

The good thing here is that it’s subtle enough to tell the story, and it is clearly being done with care. It is now part of the city’s long story, and a week I will never forget. Sadly, far worse things happen on any given day anywhere in the world, we shrug with indifference and move on.
 
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