BALTIC CHAIN MEMORIAL

What should be the meaning of a ‘memorial’? Is it about defining an architectural mark in the city’s landscape, settling a monument that keeps alive the historical record of an event? Certainly these aspects are covered, but celebrating the ‘Singing Revolution’ should be a way to reenact and communicate those feelings that were manifested in the population uniting the three Baltic countries. With this in mind, the Memorial is understood more as a direct experience of those feelings of participation and awareness-raising through dynamic installation and active attractions. The site is not occupied by a monument in the traditional sense with its fixed presence, but becomes a permanent installation in the open space for citizens to enjoy as a public space, and simultaneously introduces a floating symbol into the city landscape. The memorial consists of a ground level that displays the salient features of the historical facts in a symbolic, geometric and material transposition of the human chain. This arrangement, which can be perceived only partially by walking through it, takes on a whole other completeness in the overview of the entire area, made possible by the balloon rising up to 150 meters above ground level.