Johannesburg, South Africa
project image
Sharpeville Memorial
Sharpeville, South Africa
A memorial wall, built from clay brick, has a skeletal row of raw-steel columns along its outer edge. Each column is topped with a granite flag. These steel columns are representative of people – standing in a row, all facing the same direction. A planter in the top of the wall contains a White Freylinia hedge with delicate white flowers which juxtapose the harshness of the steel and granite along the length of the wall. Situated within the lawned space behind this wall the ‘flowers’, a series of 156 unique vertical raw-steel poles each finished off with a black and white granite ‘flower head’, serve as a permanent bouquet of flowers laid on the memorial - akin to those left daily on graves in the cemetery. An amphitheatre, consisting of a series of lawned terraces looks out to the distant horizon, dotted with power stations and industrial buildings, characteristic of this area.