FORWARD: Issue #7: Monuments & Memorials
A Case for Destruction
At a foundry in a private ceremony on October 21, 2023, a worker with a plasma torch cuts the head of a bronze monument to Civil War General Robert E. Lee. Formerly standing in Charlottesville, Virginia, the statue was melted down with the intention to use the metal to make a new public artwork, as part of the "Swords Into Plowshares" project. Photo by Eze Amos / Getty Images.
Goodbye, Robert E. Lee
By Cheyenne Concepcion
When the New Monuments Taskforce outlined its two-volume “The Relic Report: An Unofficial Municipal Study of SF’s Monuments” in 2020, following a yearlong artist-led participatory audit of San Francisco’s public monuments, the national conversation around monuments and memorials was a lot different. I liken it to the five (albeit imperfect) stages of grief, and I believe, at that time, the world was firmly planted in the second stage, anger. The pandemic and in particular the murder of George Floyd pushed America into a state of resistance, of reckoning with long-ignored societal undercurrents like racial and gender inequality, housing crises nationwide, and oppressive politics. And as the reckoning carried on and anger festered, the public centered its attention on monuments. Symbolic and ritualistic gestures of removal ensued, and many American cities were left with empty plinths and aggravated citizens.
In 2024, many plinths still lie empty as city leaders scratch their heads to find permanent solutions. In the past four years, I’ve seen communities continue organizing around monuments by bargaining (third stage of grief) with city officials for removals, recontextualization, and replacements. On the other hand, I’ve seen communities gather in mourning (fourth stage), performing rituals and addressing long-held traumas that monuments have symbolized—like my friend Joel Garcia’s work around the former Junipero Serra monument in Los Angeles, which was taken down in protest of the Catholic missions’ treatment of Natives. Today, I believe America is arriving at the fifth stage, acceptance, and I believe this recent shift in public opinion was perfectly captured by an unlikely private Charlottesville ceremony in October 2023.
Installation by New Monuments Taskforce (NMTF) during their time as Meantime Artists in Residence at Institute of Contemporary Art San Francisco. Photo courtesy NMTF.
In that private ceremony in Virginia, the widely contested monument of Confederate general Robert E. Lee met its final fate: it was dismembered and melted down to its essence for a forthcoming sculpture. Reading about this over my morning coffee made my stomach turn. I put my coffee down. I felt shocked by what seemed like an implausibly primitive solution to a metal symbol that emblematizes the monument movement in America. Isn’t it funny how a single ceremony about a memorial marker can symbolize a turning point in a movement, in history? I guess that’s how monuments work.
In 2017, March to Confront White Supremacy protesters stand in front of a covered Robert E. Lee sculpture in Charlottesville, Virginia. Photo by AgnosticPreachersKid / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 4.0.
Formerly standing in Charlottesville, Virginia, this bronze monument to Civil War General Robert E. Lee was melted down in a private ceremony on October 21, 2023. Photo by Eze Amos / Getty Images.
The eight-year-long demise of Robert E. Lee is a perfect distillation of what resistance, community care, and reconciliation can create—or destroy.
I had heard about the early advocacy work around the towering Confederate general and his horse after meeting Black, queer, femme, and trans activist Zyhana Bryant in 2019 in Philadelphia at Monument Lab’s Town Hall, where she was a fellow too. I was taken by the strength and poise she displayed as a high school student in 2016, when she started the petition to remove the monument. Since this was one of the nation’s most controversial monuments, of course, I had been well aware of the ongoing resistance to it and the creative activations that had taken place at the statue’s site. I had read about the legal battles over it. But then, frankly, I forgot about the work, thinking it must have gotten lost in the legal process. Now, though, I believe that the eight-year-long demise of Robert E. Lee is a perfect distillation of what resistance, community care, and reconciliation can create—or destroy.
Monuments are not permanent and we are not tied to past versions of ourselves as a nation.
Monument Lab Fellows panel discussion on community-led commemorative artwork at Monument Lab Town hall, 2019. From left, artists Cheyenne Concepcion, Free Bangura, and Arielle Julia Brown. Photo courtesy NMTF.
Our monuments reflect and shape how we see ourselves as a nation. This self-perception is increasingly polarized and in constant flux, while monuments as we have known them are inherently static, seemingly permanent. The work of Dr. Andrea Douglas, executive director at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center, and that of University of Virginia professor Jalane Schmidt and the Charlottesville community proves that monuments are not permanent and we are not tied to past versions of ourselves as a nation. The community-led physical deconstruction of the Robert E. Lee statue in Charlottesville signifies the transition to acceptance, along with an opportunity to permanently memorialize a public truth in place of Lee’s illegitimacy. For me, as an urban-planner-turned-artist who has been meddling in municipal matters since 2018, 2024 feels like an exciting time to be reimagining monuments of the future and reconciling with the relics left behind. The work of Dr. Douglas, Professor Schmidt, and the countless community members and organizers alongside them underscores the symbolic importance of monuments to this nation. Also, it provides an audacious yet straightforward solution often overlooked by cities and institutions: destruction.
An audacious yet straightforward solution often overlooked by cities and institutions: destruction
Destruction offers a bold path to a renewed ideology, the chance to re-create and reconstruct narratives more reflective of our times. Destruction is a necessary turning point in the cycle of grief. Destruction’s permanence signifies acceptance and ultimately leads to rebirth—but I am uncertain if it will ever be a solution posed in my city.
In San Francisco, where my monument-focused and public art work began, where NMTF is based, and from where I write this piece, I am uncertain if our city and its constituents would ever elect to destroy a monument, no matter how controversial, no matter how much harm it has caused. To use the grief analogy, perhaps we’re still in the bargaining or mourning stage because during the same time span as what unfolded in Charlottesville, San Francisco placed decommissioned monuments (such as Early Days and Christopher Columbus) and toppled monuments into storage, and we surveyed, then resurveyed, our civic art collection. In fall of 2024, still searching for permanent solutions, our city is embarking on an Equity Audit of the civic art collection and NMTF will be facilitating the public process.
In “The Relic Report: An Unofficial Municipal Study of SF’s Monuments," Volume 2 NMTF lists their guidelines for new monuments in this volume—the same guidelines they used for this FORWARD issue. Photo courtesy NMTF.
In “The Relic Report: An Unofficial Municipal Study of SF’s Monuments," Volume 1, open to the page cataloguing locations for all of San Francisco's monuments that honor men ("The Boys Club"). Photo courtesy NMTF.
As we search for permanent solutions for toppled and decommissioned monuments in San Francisco, I will remember what the community-led destruction of Robert E. Lee taught me. What unfolded in Charlottesville was a perfect storm and a powerful example of how monuments create and propagate power by upholding centuries-old myths and ideologies. What the work of Dr. Andrea Douglas and Professor Jalane Schmidt show us is that we have the power to reclaim and destroy colonial myths and wipe the slate clean for new monuments that exemplify inclusion, belonging, honesty, and shared humanity… we may just need to remember to resist, bargain, mourn, and accept first.
NMTF projected their guidelines for new monuments, "New Monuments Must," onto Yerba Buena Center for the Arts during SF Urban Film Fest in 2021. Photos courtesy NMTF.
We have the power to reclaim and destroy colonial myths and wipe the slate clean for new monuments that exemplify inclusion, belonging, honesty, and shared humanity.
Image courtesy New Monuments Task Force.
Bio
Cheyenne Concepcion
Cheyenne Concepcion is a Filipino American artist and designer whose work explores how architecture, politics, history, and aesthetics shape place across a wide range of media including sculpture, design, social practice, and public art. She creates craft-inspired sculptures, large-scale public installations, and functional objects that confront hidden histories within the American landscape. By shining a light on the stories of the people and places that have been overlooked, Concepcion uses her work to engage ideas of cultural memory, migration, and the built environment. She works between San Francisco and New York City.
Concepcion has received residencies and fellowships from Socrates Sculpture Park, Haystack Mountain School of Craft, Monument Lab, Institute of Contemporary Art San Francisco, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and the Goethe-Institut. She has exhibited at Patricia Sweetow Gallery, Los Angeles, CA (2024); High Line Nine Galleries, New York, NY (2023); Worth Ryder Art Gallery, Berkeley, CA (2018); Code & Canvas Gallery, San Francisco, CA (2019); and Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, New York, NY (2019). A self-taught artist, Cheyenne completed a BA in urban studies and planning from UC San Diego and a master’s in landscape architecture from UC Berkeley, where she was awarded a full-ride Graduate Opportunity Fellowship and the prestigious Excellence in Design Award.
FORWARD: Issue #7
Monuments & Memorials
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