Critical Analysis of The Memorial

“This day will not be forgotten”. On Tuesday, September 11th, 2001 this was the one phrase that could be heard echoing throughout many different households and on the streets of not only New York City but every major city across the world. The World Trade Center terrorist attacks became a part of not only just those who died and their family members but to everyone around the world. This was the case because, “the power of the event in the present was so shattering- so obviously and massively destructive - that there could be no doubt of its perdurance in the public domain: its futurity was assured from the start.” The terrorist attacks on September 11th, 2001 has become an event that has a very strong public memory in which our nation and world remembers the day but it also has a very strong individual memory for each person who was alive during the events of the day. The National September 11th Memorial & Museum was built in memory of the nearly 3,000 victims who were murdered on that day (and February 26th, 1993 bombings) and has the mission of, “[serving] as the country’s principal institution for examining the implications of the events of 9/11, documenting the impact of those events and exploring the continuing significance of September 11, 2001.” The National September 11th Memorial & Museum helps construct a way of thinking about the past event as a whole by remember the world before September 11th, the world during September 11th, and finally the world as we see it today.

September 11th, 2001 does not belong to just the victims and the family members, instead it belongs to the entire world. Many ‘9/11 family members’ say this because when someone dies whether it be in a car accident or even natural causes, family members are able to grieve on their own and in their own terms. September 11th was a tragedy for the world as a whole, which ended with the entire world grieving together. Every year on September 11th, the world once again grieves. Family members are bombarded with images of planes hitting the buildings and if they are down by the memorial that day they are immediately hit with questions by conspiracy theorists. Family members have never been able to grieve September 11th and their loved ones death because September 11th belongs to everyone and not just loved ones. September 11th, 2001 is a public memory and one of the most memorable public memories. What makes September 11th such a public memory was not only did 2,977 humans perish that day but also the tallest buildings in New York City collapsed. When the towers were hit immediately people on the streets had their necks craned to see what was going on up in the sky. Every T.V channel turned to the news to watch what would happen next. Chatter that was going on everywhere, no matter if someone was in New York City on the street or at home watching T.V was attempting to figure out what was going on. Many people did not know if it was a terrorist attack or just a small aircraft. It was pure confusion for many minutes and the pure confusion was captured all on video. When walking through the museum in one section you hear what the streets sounded like on the morning of September 11th. Questions as to where they should evacuate to, what was going on, was it a terrorist attacks, even frantic calling of loved ones.The visitors in the museum when walking through immediately remember the frantic calls and questions they were making that day as well. The museum allowed for public memory to shine through because “public memory is both attached to a past and acts to ensure a future of further remembering of that same event.”

While public memory is the memory that is shared with many, individual memory is focused on your personal identity, “the person who is engaged in memory on any given occasion.” Individual memory is based on ways of being reminded and by recognizing something. The National September 11th Memorial & Museum allow for each visitor to remember their individual memory. When visitors are in the museum they enter into Memorial Hall. Memorial Hall is placed 70 feet below ground in museum space and sits between the North and South tower footprints. This empty hall showcases a quote from Virgil's Aeneid and framed by a blue-tiled artwork. There are 2,983 individual blue tiles surrounding the quote, “No Day Shall Erase You from the Memory of Time”. Focusing on the individual blue tiles each tile is hand painted with watercolors, commemorating the victims of the both September 11th, 2001 and February 26th, 1993. What gives these watercolor tiles meaning to individual memory is that each tile is a unique shade of blue, not one tile is the same color of blue. The reason they are colored blue is for the sky that morning. Many people when asked about September 11th immediately remember the sky that day. When you walked on it was a perfect beginning of fall day with a crisp blue sky and not a cloud in the sky. When artist Spencer Finch was attempting to remember the color of the sky on September 11th he could not pinpoint a specific color blue. He went out and asked many New Yorkers who were there on that day and not one person agreed on the color blue. He then decided that the sky that morning was an individual memory and to commemorate that individual memory he painted each tile a different shade of blue.

The National September 11th Memorial & Museum include two different sections. The museum whose goal is to teach visitors about September 11th and the memorial whose goal is to commemorate and memorialize the victims. The memorial was also made as a ‘park’ that would be integrated into New Yorkers everyday life, “it belongs both to the city and to the memorial. Located at street level to allow for its integration into the fabric of the city, the plaza encourages the use of this space by New Yorkers on a daily basis.” The memorial plaza can be seen as part of social memory. Social memory is the memory “held in common by those who are affiliated either by kinship ties, by geographical proximity in neighborhoods, cities, and other regions, or by engagement in a common project. In other words, it is memory shared by those who are already related to each other.” New Yorkers who bear witness to the event remember what the Twin Towers looked like - what the plaza was before it turned into a large pile of debris. Those who lived and worked in New York could remember seeing the quarter mile long twin buildings every day and also could remember the “above the street” plaza. When walking onto the new plaza where the memorial sits though you are surrounded by over 400 Swamp White Oak trees and in the middle, where the North and South tower used to stand tall are two large waterfalls now taking the place of the buildings. They are technically speaking, a void. When New Yorkers walk onto the Memorial plaza now though they immediately have the memory of what used to stand there and how different the site is now.

The National September 11th Memorial & Museum were built in a way to allow visitors to remember September 11th as a whole and never forget what happened on that terrible day. The memorial and museum combine help bring back the public’s memory whether it be through their individual memory while looking at the blue wall, their social memory while walking onto the plaza, or even while walking through the beginning portion of the museum and hearing actual footage of the events of September 11th. The National September 11th Memorial & Museum helps visitors to remember and never forget the day.