charcoal and chalk on sugar paper
490 x 960 mm
This drawing comes from a synthesis of personal experience and history. I wanted to create an atmosphere of memory. I had a clear idea of the form of the building. Imposing and simple in plan with a central chimney that points to the heavens, wreathed in early morning mist which softens its shape. Surrounding the building is a maze of standing stones, perhaps memorials. Visually, you have to push through this field to reach the building. There is a sense of ritual and placing and also of the past.
I made this drawing in early 2007 with no knowledge then that I would visit a building with similarities to my invented space. When I was in Berlin in August 2008 I visited the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. When I saw how the stele were placed together to commemorate the victims of the Holocaust, I felt this drawing had, in some inexplicable way, pre-figured that experience.
