My parents are both college professors, and it made me want to question authority, standards and traditions.
Maya LinRead
I started studying what the nature of a monument is and what a monument should be. And for the World War III memorial I designed a futile, almost terrifying passage that ends nowhere.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote reflects on the concept of monuments and their purpose, emphasizing the profound emotions and thoughts a memorial can evoke.
Maya Lin explores the concept of monuments through her design for a World War III memorial, describing it as a 'futile, almost terrifying passage that ends nowhere.' This suggests that monuments are not just physical structures, but rather complex symbols that provoke deep contemplation about loss, memory, and the futility of war, encouraging viewers to engage with the ideas of absence and continuation in the face of tragedy.
Themes
MonumentMemorialDesignWarReflectionArt
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a discussion about the importance of art in commemorating historical events.
More from Maya Lin
All quotes →I try to give people a different way of looking at their surroundings. That's art to me.
Maya LinRead
How we are using up our home, how we are living and polluting the planet is frightening. It was evident when I was a child. It's more evident now.
Maya LinRead
Sometimes you have to stop thinking. Sometimes you shut down completely. I think that's true in any creative field.
Maya LinRead
A lot of my works deal with a passage, which is about time. I don't see anything that I do as a static object in space. It has to exist as a journey in time.
Maya LinRead
When I was building the Vietnam Memorial, I never once asked the veterans what it was like in the war, because from my point of view, you don't pry into other people's business.
Maya LinRead
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The true work of art is born from the 'artist': a mysterious, enigmatic, and mystical creation. It detaches itself from him, it acquires an autonomous life, becomes a personality, an independent subject, animated with a spiritual breath, the living subject of a real existence of being.
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I am interested in a political art, that is to say an art of ambiguity, contradiction, uncompleted gestures and uncertain ending - an art (and a politics) in which optimism is kept in check, and nihilism at bay.
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It's true that none of my characters are admirable. But maybe I'm primarily a satirist, and a satirist needs to hold up what's not admirable.
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It is a great art to saunter !
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