In September 2019, the Gun Violence Memorial Project opened at the Chicago Cultural Center as part of the 3rd edition of Chicago Architecture Biennial. Titled ...and other such stories, this year’s biennial reflected on the social, geopolitical, and ecological processes that affect our collective past, present, and future. The Gun Violence Memorial Project features four houses built of 700 glass bricks, each house representing the average number of lives lost due to gun violence each week in America. Over 250 families brought objects at collections held across five cities. We sat with each family as they shared their stories, receiving objects donated to honor their loved ones whose lives were taken by gun violence. The remembrance objects were placed within a glass brick, displaying the name, year of birth, and year of death of the person being honored. 250,000 people visited the Chicago Cultural Center in the 4 months that the Biennial was open.
Because of the significance of the Gun Violence Memorial Project, the City of Chicago has requested the memorial stay open for an additional month before it moves to Washington, D.C. in April 2020. If you are interested in recording your story, StoryCorps will still be available until the end of January. While we are no longer accepting objects at the Welcome Center, we will be accepting remembrance objects in the mail. Reach out to participate@massdesigngroup.org for more information.
We are so grateful to have worked with the Chicago Architecture Biennial to debut this memorial in Chicago. Thank you to the families that have shared their stories and their loved ones’ artifacts with us, and especially to Pam Bosley and Annette Nance-Holt from Purpose Over Pain for challenging us to create a memorial to their children and the countless other people affected by gun violence across the US. And to our other amazing partners that have made this work possible: Hank Willis Thomas, Everytown for Gun Safety, Newtown Action Alliance, Change the Ref, Louis D. Brown Peace Institute, Haroula Rose, Caryn Capotosto, and StoryCorps. And thank you to each of the 35 supporters and funders that believed in this work.
Because of your support, we were able to take the first step towards advancing a movement for a national, permanent memorial to gun violence victims. We look forward to advancing this movement with the next installation in D.C. and are excited to see where this next year takes us.
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