Oakland, California
This living memorial commemorates what otherwise is invisible in the clout of urban redevelopment.
Situated on temporary construction sites in Oakland, California the erection of building cranes suggests an inherent monumentality as a physical object—otherwise interpreted as a symbolic statue for the permanence of ongoing development. In its violent act of uprooting the soil and people that once belonged, the living memorial evokes an ultimate performance that reinforces the displacement and dispossession that immediately follows. Rather than an ephemeral part of everyday life, to recognize the construction site as a living memorial suggests the need to also memorialize the dispossession at its core.
This living memorial commemorates what otherwise is invisible in the clout of urban redevelopment.
Situated on temporary construction sites in Oakland, California the erection of building cranes suggests an inherent monumentality as a physical object—otherwise interpreted as a symbolic statue for the permanence of ongoing development. In its violent act of uprooting the soil and people that once belonged, the living memorial evokes an ultimate performance that reinforces the displacement and dispossession that immediately follows. Rather than an ephemeral part of everyday life, to recognize the construction site as a living memorial suggests the need to also memorialize the dispossession at its core.