Introduction

The All Wars Memorial to Colored Soldiers and Sailors in Logan Square.

Art of all forms often comes under intense public scrutiny.  When it is considered that the “public” is the intended audience for a vast majority of art pieces, the analyses come as no surprise.  Art pieces are statements of belief or intent, created to provoke ideas, feelings or memories.  Those that are created for public spaces are subject to the politics of said provocations.  Within the realm of public art, monuments are the most vulnerable to politics.  We refer to these political battles as “controversies,” disputes that often involve either site, style or size.[1] 

With The All Wars Memorial to Colored Soldiers and Sailors in Philadelphia, the politics of site were at play (injected with a healthy dose of racism).  Several sites could not be agreed upon by the agencies in charge, with the final out-of-the-way compromise insulting to the men the monument was designed to honor. Only after several decades of quiet isolation was the fight renewed for a new, more racially aware America.  Although The All Wars Memorial to Colored Soldiers and Sailors now occupies a prominent site in Philadelphia, the inception of the monument, the initial controversy and the activism used to alter the site are important pieces to understanding the politics of site selection in the world of monument building.