The 9/11 Memorial Museum must have been an extraordinarily challenging task to design and curate – and the result, I think, has met the challenge. Upon entry, the sequence of spaces that the visitor moves through are thoughtful, magnificent, respectful and unflinching. In part because the actual site, its foundations and remnants are incorporated into the experience.
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Visitors to the Museum descend a gently sloped ramp as they make their way to the original foundation level, where the main exhibition space is located. The descent echoes the construction ramps used to build the original World Trade Center, which were placed again at the site in the aftermath of the attacks for removal of debris and to provide access for victims’ family members and others on the anniversaries of 9/11.
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Before entering the exhibitions that provide most of the information (too much by the end), the galleries are more places of contemplation, focused on the most dramatic remnants from that day in September at the beginning of the millennium.
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Because of the dramatic display and sanctified context, the memorial can begin to feel more like an art gallery for artistic appreciation of sculptural objects, almost denuded of their meaning. I expect the curators and others have debated whether this in fact has festishized 9/11. But there was no way around it.
Okay so who did it?
Inside Job!