Carolina QuotesI have fought very, very hard to get past being known as the Monument Maker.
Maya Lin Connected to the Carolinas
Source
"Maya Lin, The Reluctant Memorialist" in The New Yorker (30 June 2022)
- year
- 2022
Cite this record
“I have fought very, very hard to get past being known as the…” Maya Lin. Carolina Quotes, record CQ-B2F09B18FC. https://carolinaquotes.com/quote/b2f09b18fc
More from Maya Lin
I try to understand the "why" of a project before it's a "what." And this might be more pertinent to some of my memorial projects. Memorials are a hybrid between art and architecture because they have a function.
I leave it up to the viewers. If it’s in a museum, if it’s in a gallery, usually I am going to point out something about a river right below your feet or right outside your window. I’m not going to scream it out. If you get a little curious, you can find a little bit more. At times my works are maybe to a fault subtle. For public works, maybe you won’t even notice I was here. I’m not trying to defeat or conquer nature.
It took a lot to understand and to thread a path that would allow me to develop in architecture, and develop my voice there, develop my voice in art. I wasn’t abandoning what I would call my interest in history and memory.