Memorials are used as a public memory, to remember and honor a past event, or influential person. Our class started off this project by discussing some notable memorials and we learned how to analyze the different aspects (size, shape, colours, symbology, placement, location) and thought that went behind the design. Some memorials that we talked about were Mount Rushmore, Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the Holocaust memorial.
Using our newfound knowledge on the aspects of memorials we designed our own memorials out of Lego. I created my lego memorial to honour the memory of the people who died on the SS. Mendi. I didn’t have all the lego pieces I needed to create my vision so I used mark-up to add the details that I couldn’t achieve with lego.
Some of the main features that I added to my memorial were, buckets full of water that empty in the morning and refill throughout the day and night. It also will span the length of the SS. Mendi ship. I wrote a paragraph going into greater detail of my memorial. I composed details of the tragedy of the sinking of the SS. Mendi which would be included on a plaque. Paragraph link.
We used the knowledge that we gained designing individual memorials to work on creating a memorial within a group. The class was spilt into 9 groups, and I worked with Sophia and Charlie (You can visit there blogs here and here). Each group had to research and create a memorial for either South Asia (specifically the Punjab region), Japan or China. My group got assigned South Asia. We each contributed our own individual creation, and we collaborated as a group on one memorial that represented the Komagata Maru.
My individual creation was a poster on the pushes and pulls of immigration of Sikhs to Canada. I brainstormed 12 main pushes and pulls and then provided further detail on a couple of them.
Some of the information that I included in my poster is below:
Pulls for Sikhs to come to Canada.
Labour
Agriculture
Political stability
Economic benefits
More freedom
Presence of established Sikh communities
Pushes for Sikhs to leave India.
Economic Hardships
Political instability
Religious persecution
Lack of opportunities
Overpopulation
Discrimination
For our group memorial we started by doing research on the Komagata Maru. The Komagata Maru was a ship that sailed with a few thousand South Asians (mostly Punjab men) immigrants into a port in Vancouver hoping to live and work in Canada. The Canadian government refused to let the people on the Komagata Maru into Canada and as a result they were stranded in the port for 2 months with decreasing food and water supplies and were forced to sail back to India. When they arrived back in India, British authorities suspected that passengers were arriving to make trouble. Shooting started and officially, 26 people died although there were possibly more unrecorded deaths. If you want to get a deeper understating of the Komagata Maru, I found this video extremely helpful during my research.
We planned our memorial and had many ideas but ultimately, we ended up deciding to create a 3D model of the Komagata Maru surrounded by 26 trees, one tree for each official death that occurred.
During this exhibition we had a small grade 10 competition. Within each memorial category there was one winner from the three groups that were presenting a different memorial about the same event. To decide this winner, the visitors were asked to look at all of the displays and select their favourite ones…
Our group ended up winning with a grand total of 44 votes. I think we were so successful because our group was extremely organized, and we all were able to complete out tasks on time and to the best of our ability. We also have an interesting name that I think stuck in people’s brains when they went to vote (our group name was Tantalus). I would say we had one of the most professional looking memorials thanks to Charlie’s 3D printer which allowed parents and viewers to see our vision slightly clearer than out competitor’s. I think we would’ve have done even better if we had gotten a better spot in the room. We were by the back and there wasn’t much light so that could have potential stopped viewers from being drawn to our station. I loved this project because I got to create something physical and show it off to an audience and this has definitely been one of my favourite projects of this year. Thanks for reading and happy 2024!