Teachable Monuments: Using Public Art to Spark Dialogue and Confront Controversy

Monuments around the world have become the focus of intense and sustained discussions, activism, vandalism, and removal. Since the convulsive events of 2015 and 2017, during which white supremacists committed violence in the shadow of Confederate symbols, and the 2020 nationwide protests against racism and police brutality, protesters and politicians in the United States have removed Confederate monuments, as well as monuments to historical figures like Christopher Columbus and Dr. J. Marion Sims, questioning their legitimacy as present-day heroes that their place in the public sphere reinforces. The essays included in this anthology offer guidelines and case studies tailored for students and teachers to demonstrate how monuments can be used to deepen civic and historical engagement and social dialogue. Essays analyze specific controversies throughout North America with various outcomes as well as examples of monuments that convey outdated or unwelcome value systems without prompting debate.

Sierra Rooney is Assistant Professor of Art History at University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, USA. She is the author of numerous articles on public monuments and controversy.

Jennifer Wingate is an art historian based in the USA who writes about American art and material culture. She is co-editor of Teachable Monuments: Using Public Art to Spark Dialogue and Confront Controversies (Bloomsbury, 2021) and author of Sculpting Doughboys: Memory, Gender, and Taste in America's World War I Memorials (2013).

Harriet F. Senie is Professor Emerita of Art History at the City College of New York and the Graduate Center, The City University of New York, USA. She is the author of Memorials to Shattered Myths: Vietnam to 9/11 (2015), The 'Tilted Arc' Controversy: Dangerous Precedent? (2001), and Contemporary Public Sculpture: Tradition, Transformation, and Controversy (1992). She has edited several anthologies on different aspects of public art.