The monumental complex of Târgu-Jiu, made between 1937 and 1938, is articulated in three units, the Table of Silence, the Gate of the Kiss, the Endless Column, connected one with other by the The road of the Heroes which, starting from the banks of the River Jiu, flows perpendicularly from one end to the other of the city up to the square of the ancient hay market (fig. 4). A spatial system that by reuniting three arts – sculpture, architecture and urban planning – achieves one of the most effective and unpublished commemorative monuments to the fallen of the First World War. A spatial system that by reuniting three arts – sculpture, architecture and urban planning – achieves one of the most effective and unpublished commemorative monuments to the fallen of the First World War. Indeed, this is a memorial in remembrance of the soldiers who fell in defence of the city of Târgu-Jiu from the German attack in 1916. Romania, on a par with many other European countries involved in the Great War, has dedicated many sculptural works to the soldiers who died in World War One.From the analysis proposed here it emerges how the Târgu-Jiu complex can be read at several levels: certainly, interconnected with one another, but also autonomous. In all, however, the visitor is actively involved in an experience that leads him from the horizontality of his movement to the verticality of the Column, to the contact with the heavens. In tits role of memorial, it is conceived of as a mnemotechnical device, a support of memory that is based on the construction of contact between the local community and its glorious war dead. It is born from death, it materialises the absence to make it visible and, at the same time, puts death in communication with life, by means of a path that actualises the theme of the encounter and the contact with the day-to-day and the divine, between the city and its war dead. By means of the three steps of ideation, a work unfold whose aim is to preserve into infinity the memory of the fallen, being configured as a “scar” in the fabric of the city, a wound bound, healed, that will stay visible forever. However, if we look carefully, this realisation is also something more, as is confirmed by the continuity of the practices that even today it is able to arouse in the visitors: by telling of death, its affirms life, this time, however, in the sense of the monument as such. Indeed, in its role as monument it manages to overturn the most consolidated negative characteristics of this commemorative typology. Unlike the memorials it is not guarded over and protected by fences and barriers. Its use is not circumscribed to the ceremonial event, to the anniversary that serves as remembrance; actually, as we have seen, it is used daily by everyone. It is not subject to vandalism: it has even been able to get through the long era of the Communist regime in Romania unscathed. It is not relegated to a place that in time has lost its centrality: it remains in contact with the very heart if the metropolitan organism. In short, it is not subject to wear and tear, as instead inevitably happens in most monuments. Ultimately, it is not a monument “sans public, dont on a perdu, par ignorance ou saturation l’usage et le sens” . If “tout monument rêve non pas d’être signe, mais de laisser un signe” , it is certain that this sculptural and spatial complex of Târgu-Jiu has left its mark: with the path and the practices that it has activated and it is activating it has kept itself “golden” and is destined to preserving in time its unforgettable “aura”.
Brâncuși: The Memory of Infinity
CORRAIN, LUCIA
2015
Abstract
The monumental complex of Târgu-Jiu, made between 1937 and 1938, is articulated in three units, the Table of Silence, the Gate of the Kiss, the Endless Column, connected one with other by the The road of the Heroes which, starting from the banks of the River Jiu, flows perpendicularly from one end to the other of the city up to the square of the ancient hay market (fig. 4). A spatial system that by reuniting three arts – sculpture, architecture and urban planning – achieves one of the most effective and unpublished commemorative monuments to the fallen of the First World War. A spatial system that by reuniting three arts – sculpture, architecture and urban planning – achieves one of the most effective and unpublished commemorative monuments to the fallen of the First World War. Indeed, this is a memorial in remembrance of the soldiers who fell in defence of the city of Târgu-Jiu from the German attack in 1916. Romania, on a par with many other European countries involved in the Great War, has dedicated many sculptural works to the soldiers who died in World War One.From the analysis proposed here it emerges how the Târgu-Jiu complex can be read at several levels: certainly, interconnected with one another, but also autonomous. In all, however, the visitor is actively involved in an experience that leads him from the horizontality of his movement to the verticality of the Column, to the contact with the heavens. In tits role of memorial, it is conceived of as a mnemotechnical device, a support of memory that is based on the construction of contact between the local community and its glorious war dead. It is born from death, it materialises the absence to make it visible and, at the same time, puts death in communication with life, by means of a path that actualises the theme of the encounter and the contact with the day-to-day and the divine, between the city and its war dead. By means of the three steps of ideation, a work unfold whose aim is to preserve into infinity the memory of the fallen, being configured as a “scar” in the fabric of the city, a wound bound, healed, that will stay visible forever. However, if we look carefully, this realisation is also something more, as is confirmed by the continuity of the practices that even today it is able to arouse in the visitors: by telling of death, its affirms life, this time, however, in the sense of the monument as such. Indeed, in its role as monument it manages to overturn the most consolidated negative characteristics of this commemorative typology. Unlike the memorials it is not guarded over and protected by fences and barriers. Its use is not circumscribed to the ceremonial event, to the anniversary that serves as remembrance; actually, as we have seen, it is used daily by everyone. It is not subject to vandalism: it has even been able to get through the long era of the Communist regime in Romania unscathed. It is not relegated to a place that in time has lost its centrality: it remains in contact with the very heart if the metropolitan organism. In short, it is not subject to wear and tear, as instead inevitably happens in most monuments. Ultimately, it is not a monument “sans public, dont on a perdu, par ignorance ou saturation l’usage et le sens” . If “tout monument rêve non pas d’être signe, mais de laisser un signe” , it is certain that this sculptural and spatial complex of Târgu-Jiu has left its mark: with the path and the practices that it has activated and it is activating it has kept itself “golden” and is destined to preserving in time its unforgettable “aura”.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
