THE Wall

[onesix]

I wonder if anybody else has had the same experience as I have.

I've been to the wall several time, and whenever I stand in front of the 3 soldiers statue, the eyes of the one on the right seem to follow me whenever I move. They're cast in bronze, how can this be?

[BLUEHAWK]

Today I am thinking a little more straight, I think..

I was up to my ears in a public service art professional's career when The Wall was being planned and considered. How it eventually turned out came as a total surprise, to me and my colleagues in our ivory towers, and could not have been better arranged by God himself.

None of us had any idea that the selection committee would choose that particular design for a memorial about Vietnam. All bets went with some hot shot super star sculptor winning the competition. Some very brave soul on that committee championed Maya Lin's design, and I would like to know which of them it was. That person deserves a lot of our gratitude.

Then what happens? A totally unknown-college-kid-asian-female-architecture student hits the nail on the head, and sends a generation of warriors and families to a black marble V cut into the soil of a nation's capitol... to mourn our fallen friends by name, our once neglected and reviled comrades-in-arms, and the black marks upon our national honor which culminated with the words, "I am not a crook!", and "It depends on what the meaning of the word 'Is' is."

One of our protectors, Mr. Ross Perot, nearly got all the way to the White House because he, too, went against the art cartel by insisting that there be included at The Wall a classical realist group of figures as well.

I will go to The Wall. I will go alone at sunrise... for now I know that when I get there, and when I crumble in grief on my knees before the testimony of sacrifice my generation has learned to bear... their honor to duty will give me the temerity to stand up again on my own two feet and carry their flag for America as it is today, as best they did.

[BLUEHAWK]

onesix -

What you describe is an uncommon experience of the rare few viewers of any figurative sculpture who are somehow very moved by what their eyes and heart are seeing.

I have been in the art business more than half my life, 30 years. The phenomenon you are talking about is associated with emotional attachment personal to yourself and that figure on the right. Other people may become attached to one or more of the adjacent figures, in other words.

Chances are there does exist some deep connection only you will ever understand between yourself and the right hand figure.

You may be watching it, as much as it is following you.

[BLUEHAWK]

It is noteworthy that the National Park Service web site about The Wall clearly states that the purpose of that memorial is, also, to offer reconciliation
for a disagreeable foreign policy...my words.

[onesix]

One thing about the wall, and all of the other war memorials that have gone up in D.C. since 1982 is that they have been conceived, funded, and built by the Veteran's themselves, not a greatful nation.

Nevertheless, the National Park Service has been happy to accept their ownership in behalf of the nation, as long as the funding for their maintenance and upkeep comes from the various Veteran funds that built them.

Our greatful nation has tried to stonewall each and everyone of them.

[BLUEHAWK]

onesix

Good grief... I had no idea of that at all.

[Sgt_Tropo]

THe WALL was built with the veteran's money, maintained with the veterans' money and with absolutely NONE of the monies coming from our "grateful" nation. Is it any wonder that the WALL is THE most visited site and memorial in all of Washington, DC and the nation ??
I guess Generation X & Y are going to have to fund their memorial for the Gulf War veterans, because they sure as all get-out won't be getting any help from Uncle Sammy !! They could always just build a simple little sandbox, fill in with middle-eastern sand and place a couple of miniture oil derricks in it. After all, isn't that what it seems that "we're" really fighting for ?
Now don't everyone start blasting me at once. I know that we're fighting to bring an end to a tyrant and his sons and henchmen, but I've yet to see the over-whelming crowds of grateful Iraqis. The news makes it seem like most Iraqis simply want us gone, so they and their favorite mullas can start killing each other all over again. What is it that makes it so hard for these sand-rats to understand about the sancitity of life and basic freedoms, such as the rigth to live ?!? :cd:

[Boats]

Troop

Well said but every conflict cost lives regardless of its overall intentions. These kids today are no different than you or I in our day like our Father's and Grand-Father's in their all the way back to the Plymouth Rock landing.

If it isn't over religion its over material wealth and I don't think its going to end anytime soon.

I know you meant well - we all think like you and its a shame that the kids will have to wait until enough pocket money becomes available for their monument to be built.

Its 5:30 pm and I've been here 11 hours so I'm calling it a day see ya in the AM.

[BLUEHAWK]

Well, the WW II memorial is on its way up now, on the Mall... maybe the kids Boats is talking about will need to build theirs somewhere on there too, and so Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom vets might want to combine theirs somehow (same sand), and then there are the ones to come after that war, maybe a Korea War II is on the way I guess, could even be something happening in Syria and Iran fairly soon... this Iraq war actually got started planning right around September 2001 from all I can tell, so that would put wars in Iran and Syria maybe out to 2004-05. We still have people in the Balkans and Afghanistan, maybe now another "police action" in Liberia that could turn ugly too.

Gonna run out of room on that Mall.

But we got 43,000,000+ living vets, at a dollar apiece that oughta hold us awhile for maintenance and new construction.

[MORTARDUDE]

There are not 43,000,000 living vets....

In 1990 there were 27,619,205

In 2000 there were 26,549,704

This represents a 3.9% drop ( -1,069,501 )

We are an ever shrinking and fractured minority. The more in-fighting we have amongst all the various groups who are supposed to represent veterans concerns and among each other,
the more we will get screwed by all the politicians, until there are so few of us they can just ignore us...not unlike what they have been doing for the past 85 years.

Source :

http://www.va.gov/vetdata/Census2000...2000vs1990.pdf

Larry