I will do my best to rise to the enormity of the task at hand. It is with great humility that I regard the challenges that lie ahead -- and it is with great hope that I will find the strength and ability to meet them
Michael Arad
strength ability challenges humility find lie hand great hope rise
This design proposes a space that resonates with the feelings of loss and absence that were generated by the death and destruction at the World Trade Center
design absence death world loss feelings space destruction trade
It encloses the site and shelters it from the highway
How do you design it so that people can form a space of their own, and feel quiet and contemplative?
design people
I hope for the experience of people standing together, turning their backs to the city and facing this, and hearing the leaves rustle. Well, maybe it won't be as bucolic as at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, but I know you will feel removed from the city.
people experience
It sounds really over the top to say you're responsible for the city of New York, but I do feel responsibility to the city of New York, to this country, to people everywhere. So many people were affected by the events of September 11, and I feel this is one of the ways that that event will be understood and defined.
sound people
When I was in the Army, the unit I served in, you could never stop. It was a volunteer unit, and there was a fairly high rate of attrition. The people who stayed through are the people who were either great at it or the people who just didn't know how to stop. And I fell into that second category.
people
When I started this project, I was a young architect. I was very apprehensive about any changes to the design. Whether I wanted to or not, I learned that you can accept some changes to its form without compromising its intent. But it's a leap of faith that I didn't want to make initially - to put it mildly.
design change faith
No rendering can really simulate the way the light bounces off the bronze panel. From some angles, it's almost a mirror, and from others it's a matte surface.
light
I pushed the process forward by saying, 'We should do this, this, and this right now. Please find the budget for me to find a structural engineer, a mechanical engineer, a civil engineer, so we can do the preliminary work.
rights work
New York was a place I wanted to live and work all along. If I wasn't going to live in Israel, I had to live in New York.
places work
I built a series of supporters that had my back. I never abused that trust. You can't cry wolf. You have to solve most problems yourself.
trust
I have no choice but to fight them every step of the way. I can't tell you how many other stupid ideas have been proposed over the last two years.
choice
For two years nobody talked about anything other than the name arrangement. There was no fund-raising and no progress being made on construction and design.
progress design
I think my desire to imagine a future for this site came out of trying to come to terms with the emotions that day aroused.
emotions
You must log in to post a comment.
There are no comments yet.