PHOTOS: NYC’s first LGBTQ monument opens in Greenwich Village
Photo by Tia Richards for 6sqft
New York’s first public monument to the LGBTQ community opened Sunday in the Greenwich Village, a historically significant neighborhood for the gay rights movement. Located in Hudson River Park and designed by local artist Anthony Goicolea, the monument honors the victims of the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting, as well as all victims of hate and violence.
“This memorial saddens us, when we think about the Orlando 49 senseless deaths, but it also enlightens us, and it also inspires us,” Cuomo said on Sunday. “It inspires New Yorkers to do what New Yorkers have always done – what Anthony was referring to: to push forward, to keep going forward on that journey until we reach the destination that the Statue of Liberty promised in the first place.”
Photo via Gov. Cuomo’s office on Flickr
As 6sqft reported last week, the monument includes nine modified boulders that are bisected with a clear, laminated glass with refractory components to create a prism. When light hits the prism, rainbows, a symbol of LGBT pride, will form on the grass and surrounding areas.
The monument, arranged in a circle, invites visitors to sit, talk and enjoy the Hudson River views. Goicolea told Urban Omnibus in an interview this month, that the design borders that line of playful and solemn. “Really the stones are simply the pedestals for the true memorial, which is the people that are sitting there. They can be sitting by themselves but with other people in this arranged format, so, alone, but not alone. Alone together.”
Photos by Tia Richards for 6sqft
Following the Orlando tragedy, Cuomo soon established the LGBT Memorial Commission, whose 10 members were tasked with finding an artist to design and build a monument to the LGBT community. In October of that year, the commission issued a request for proposals, asking for creative, original pieces with a clear theme. Goicolea’s design was chosen a year later.
In partnership with Airbnb, Goicolea is hosting a tour of the memorial with his husband Paul Kelterborn, the artist who co-designed the AIDS Memorial at St. Vincent’s Park. All of the proceeds will go to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center. Find out more about the event and the memorial here.
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