I grew up in a country where statues, while not as abundant as they seem to be in Europe, are definitely not unusual. You could see them throughout cities, at key towns, etc. standing silently as a reminder of what has occurred or what, from our past, should be honoured.
However, I suddenly realised this week that there are no (I just recalled one on the capitol building) a limited number of statues here in my new home in the US. I know they exist in this country but in this state they are either well hidden or not as popular. There are memorial gardens, plaques and alike but no sculpture to drag your eye towards them.
So does that mean that a sense of history is lacking? Not at all. But it seems it is handled very differently.
Where statues are more prevalent I feel that there is a sense of history as what the nation/state was built on. It’s what went before to make us who we are today. The hardened metal symbolises that the individual or idea being immortalised is important but the faded, weathered and tarnished appearance tightly locks them into the past.
The Bad: History can be regarded as irrelevant to today’s culture.
The Good: It can allow the culture to move forward, to remember and yet have a different future, to maintain a sense of identify and yet refine and enlarge that identity.
Where statues are less prevalent I feel that history is either totally lacking (through ignorance, although I think this is very rare) but more commonly that history is alive and breathing in the minds of the people.
The Good: History can live on in the minds of the people. It is less likely to be lost as it is living and active or left to certain days of the year.
The Bad: History can be distorted by the mind. Also, when it is solidified in the mind, combined with many humans difficulty with change (which requires changes in the mind) then progress can be hampered.
At least this has been my experience so far. Have you a different one?
