Memorial Project!

When we got this assignment I was a little stumped on what memorial I was going to do. I thought about to doing one for the Holocaust or maybe Ground Zero. However, I felt like I was taking the easy way out if I did not do an Irish memorial while I was in Ireland. For that reason I have picked is Famine Memorial by Edward Delaney (1930-2009) located in  St Stephan's Green Park in Dublin. The reason I have picked this one is because on the first trip to Dublin on June 27th my class, Nick Norwood's World Literature, actually walked through this park. I was actually fascinated by this piece of art in the beginning of the park, so naturally I took my own pictures of it.

 This is the picture I took of the memorial!

And is just a better angle.

 

This memorial is dedicated to the Great Famine that hit Ireland between 1845 and 1852. This was a horrible time for the Ireland's population. One million people died and then one million people left the country. The reason for the famine is because the potato crop got hit with the disease know as  potato blight which at the time was most Irish families main source of food. It hit the middle class and lower classes the most. It was a horrible time for the Irish nation.

 

It is an abstract piece. The figures do not completely look like humans. I think he choose to do abstract and make these figures look abnormal to get the point across. That the Great Famine did so much damage to the human body, because of the hunger people went though it changed their bodies into things that were not recognizable. People were skin and bones and Edward Delanery did not want to sugar coat it. He was trying to remind the public of the ugliness of the famine. When asked Delanery said "Truth lies in proportions, not in size." Well in1971, the memorial was blown up by unhappy citizens and had to be reconstructed by the artist, and through the blast only the head survived of one figure.

 

The memorial is created by using the lost-wax method of bronze casting. It is human sized and has that blue tent of the bronze casting. It simple has a wall behind it and two potted flower plants on either side of it. I believe he wanted to get a reaction from the public so putting in a public park was probably the best idea. Being in a park you know people are going to see it. You can walk all the way around the figures. You can tell that Edward Delanery wanted the entire piece to be a statement, because even the backside of the figures were odd shaped. 

 This is from a different angle to show you the sides of the figures and the black and white takes it to the new level. Not having any color makes it seems more uncomfortable.

 These are the flowers by the memorial!

 

Even though this memorial is not very well known it is powerful. Like I said earlier looking at the figures makes you start thinking about why these people are so deformed and then finding out that it is about the Great Famine hits you hard. The artist wanted to make you do a double take, to make you think, and to make you feel the sadness of this disaster. That is why I choose to do this piece, because it made me do all three of those things the moment I saw it in the park.