Vietnam Veterans Memorial

I'm continuing my look back at memorials I researched for my MFA with a study of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C.


The above shot is one stretch of the wall. It was impossible to get a shot of the complete memorial because of the number of tourists visiting the site. Below is an article which I originally wrote for The College Voice in July 2006.

VVM & WWII

For my MFA I have been researching memorials around the world. My main interest is group memorials that list the names of individuals, where the individual within the group is just as important as the group itself. I have been looking mainly at war memorials, Holocaust memorials, and memorials to people who have died of AIDS. The people commemorated by a memorial, as well as the people to whom the memorial speaks, affect the design vocabulary that a memorial uses.

During a visit to Washington, D.C., I saw two memorials that provide interesting insights into the uses of memorials and their meanings. The Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial (VVM) and The National World War II Memorial (WWII) are only 500m or so apart, but they occupy vastly different spaces in the American psyche. I offer a brief overview of these two memorials to see how they differ in their symbolic language and meanings. WWII is a national memorial that celebrates the American victory in World War II, remembering the deeds of all those who fought in the war, and not just those who died. The VVM, however, is aimed at the veterans of the war, not the nation, and not in memory of the war itself.


The design of the VVM reflects this emphasis. It is a wall of polished black granite engraved with the names of the dead or missing servicemen from the Vietnam War. The names are arranged in chronological order so that one can see the rise in the number of casualties as the war progressed. And that is all that the memorial has - no arches, no colonnades, no domes. It is a minimalist memorial where the emphasis is on the individuals who died. The WWII has no names of the dead, although it does have the Freedom Wall with its 420 gold stars, each representing approximately 100 dead.

This difference in the type of commemoration (names vs. no names) reflects the emphasis of these two memorials. The WWII is a celebration of life, of liberation from fascism, and for freedom and democracy. The VVM is about remembering dead comrades when the public and government seemed to wish that they would be forgotten - to pretend that the war had never happened. As one walks along the VVM’s walls, one slowly walks downwards until the walls are towering above. This is a descent into the earth, like a grave, with the black granite panels resembling tombstones. The WWII, in contrast, is mostly level with the surrounding ground, it is light and open, and the white stone arches and pillars resemble classical temples rather than a graveyard. The pond and fountain in the centre evoke the middle of a city, a place where people meet and celebrate.

The style of architecture of the WWII fits with its place on the Mall, and the axis of history there. It is between the Washington Monument, and the Lincoln Memorial, and along the same axis as the Capitol building, all built with white stone. A text engraved at the entrance to the memorial explains its historical placement:

HERE IN THE PRESENCE OF WASHINGTON AND LINCOLN,
ONE THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY FATHER, AND THE OTHER THE
NINETEENTH CENTURY PRESERVER OF OUR NATION, WE HONOR
THOSE TWENTIETH CENTURY AMERICANS WHO TOOK UP THE STRUGGLE
DURING THE SECOND WORLD WAR AND MADE THE SACRIFICES TO
PERPETUATE THE GIFT OUR FOREFATHERS ENTRUSTED TO US:
A NATION CONCEIVED IN LIBERTY AND JUSTICE.

So World War II was a noble war, and one that affirms America’s sense of itself as a country that has a divine mission to bring freedom to the world.
The Vietnam War clearly doesn’t fit with this view. One view is that the United States sought not to liberate Vietnam, but to prevent its citizens from exercising their democratic right to elect its own government. That, and the fact that the U.S. lost the war, has resulted in this memorial being put to the side of the main axis of history. Even knowing where it was located, I had trouble finding it in the grove of trees which surrounds it. Maya Lin, in her design, however, has attempted to connect the memorial to the history of the nation – one arm of the wall points towards the Washington Monument, and the other towards the Lincoln Memorial.

Although President Clinton signed legislation to establish the WWII Memorial in 1993, it was not dedicated and opened to the public until 2004. I can’t say whether the current administration unduly influenced the shape of the WWII, but I feel the memorial is connected to the current war in Iraq through the use of quotes engraved at various places. On the flagpoles is written:

AMERICANS CAME TO LIBERATE, NOT TO CONQUER,
TO RESTORE FREEDOM AND TO END TYRANNY

And on one of the walls is this quote from General George C. Marshall:


My feeling is that it has been designed not only to celebrate a past war, but also to link the meanings of that war with the current one. It is, in my view, a propaganda exercise designed to remind people of the values that America allegedly stands for, and the rightness of the mission to spread those values around the world.

The VVM, despite the opposition to it in the beginning, has become part of the establishment, and is firmly on the tourist map of Washington. By concentrating on only the names of the dead, Lin was able to focus the memorial away from the contentious war, and towards the sacrifices made by those in the armed forces. Her focus, however, was undermined once the project was underway by those who felt that the memorial wasn’t military enough, and was perhaps too critical of the war, even though this is what makes it successful. After the wall was completed, a sculptural tableau of three soldiers was placed 100m away, and, nearby, a large flagpole flying an American flag has been permanently erected to add further meaning to the memorial site. Of course this is an attempt to make Lin’s design fit in more with the kinds of memorial evoked by the WWII.

These added elements are, to my mind, clumsy and unnecessary, and were strenuously opposed by Lin herself. Along with the rather sorry state of the landscaping around the wall, these parts of the memorial detract from the elegance and simplicity of Lin’s design.


This brief examination of two of dozens of memorials in the U.S. capital illustrates the way that design elements shape the meanings of that which they commemorate. The two wars remembered in these memorials were different kinds of war, and needed to be remembered in different ways. The two memorials, although vastly different in style, are both successful at communicating meaning to the viewer.

Rodney Love is a Master of Fine Arts student in the School of Art.

Photos courtesy of the author.
1. Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial, Washington, D. C.
2. National World War II Memorial, Washington, D.C.
3. National World War II Memorial, Washington, D.C.
4. Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial, Washington, D.C.






Here are images highlighting some problems with the VVM - too many tourists squeezed onto a small path; not being able to step back to get a wide view of the memorial; poor landscaping around the memorial; tacky fencing to prevent people from walking above the memorial.




Lastly, here's a rubbing I took at the VVM.