One Man’s Treasure is Another Man’s…
by National Trust for Historic Preservation on September 2nd, 2009Written by Priya Chhaya
This past week I stumbled across this article on Bloomberg.com, which is a brief sketch of individuals who have thrown objects at valuable pieces of art. Some part of me cries sacrilege, while another part recognizes some (not all) as audacious expressions of protest against a perceived injustice. And it got me thinking about what we value as a society, what we fight to preserve, and how we designate something as worthy. So often art provides a connection for one individual on a visceral level, while for others it’s really just a waste of space. Take the website called Graffiti Archaeology. A form of expression often connected to gangs and blight, Graffiti is “equal parts public art and vandalism, virtuosity and subversion, it is among the most ephemeral forms of human expression” (Cassidy Curtis, creator and Graphic Archaeologist). Here layer after layer is stripped away (as an archaeologist would look at stratigraphy) to reveal shifting rhythms and ideas over time. In Recognize! an exhibition at the National Portrait gallery, graffiti is identified as one of the four elements of hip-hop expression.
So what does this have to do with historic preservation? There are spaces honored for their sense of place in the past—where someone died, built something, or was born. What a die-hard fan of the Gold Rush might find intriguing, another might pass without another glance. Last week a decision came down regarding the plans to build a Wal-Mart on the Wilderness Battlefield. This decision ended one phase of a year-long clash between preservationists and those fighting for more economic stability in terms of jobs and cheaper goods for Orange County. It’s not that both sides don’t value the battlefield for what it represents (or that County is in need of economic development), but rather a question as to the degree of its larger worth in the face of circumstances in the here and now. For preservationists the solution means seeking out an alternate location—several have been suggested, and while each has its own particular challenges, doing so encourages Orange County to add another layer to its history, without covering one it already has.
Of course, big box stores are not necessarily here to stay—every day I pass by the empty shells of two Circuit City shops. The site of the original store—which was vacated a decade ago for a shinier version in a strip mall a few miles away and a recent victim of the recession—now stands empty in a deserted parking lot with a sign asking for someone to value it. So one man’s history is another man’s Wal-Mart. Why can’t we reconcile these two disparities in the spirit of compromise?
Priya Chhaya is the program assistant in the office of Training and Online Information Services at the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
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