ABSTRACT
Since September 11, 2001, the skyline of Manhattan is absent its two largest peaks; the loss has disseminated wrenching pain across multiple strata in the life of the city. It left an open wound on the ground that constantly references a past event yet speaks to its lingering presence. The current lack of closure at the wounded site—both the skyline and the ground—also underscores the indeterminacy of what the future holds when the time for rebuilding arrives. How does one approach the reality of the event of September 11 and simultaneously retain it as a critical and reflective activity? If only the wound in the skyline becomes the center of focus and the void in its outline quickly filled in, then the narration of human events related to the site’s wreckage will be buried and forgotten too soon. Conversely, if only the injuries are accounted for, the deaths enumerated, the economic losses piled up, then collective pain and memory will remain an abstraction, dissolved into insignificant details and imposed coherence. Contrary to the desire that seeks closure by rebuilding the void in the heart of the financial district, and in spite of the need to recount the events on the ground, to retell the many stories of trauma, there is a battle to be waged against prematurely fixing the image of pain and loss into static images and abstract accounts.
