"Around the Bay Area, where the term "move fast and break things" originated, it's easy to lose sight of the historical moments that have shaped our landscapes. Whether you're looking at a Julia Morgan-designed columbarium or an abstract bell tower that memorializes a child's last gifts, there are plenty of monuments around the region that not only remind us about the past - but challenge us to envision what that means for our present and future."
"Whether he's wearing a jack-o'-lantern head or a pandemic mask, Santa Cruz's surfer sculpture stands sentinel over West Cliff Drive, a young man stoically holding a surfboard as he stares out to the horizon. The surfer was commissioned in 1989 by the Santa Cruz Historical Association following a competition to create a monument to surfers past, present and future, says sculptor Thomas Marsh, who won the competition with a former student, Brian Curtis."
Bay Area monuments commemorate diverse local histories and prompt reflection on collective memory and identity. Examples range from a Julia Morgan-designed columbarium to an abstract bell tower created to memorialize a child's gifts. Santa Cruz's surfer sculpture, commissioned in 1989 and unveiled in 1992 after delays caused by the October 1989 earthquake, replicates 1930s surfing styles and seeks to capture youth on the verge of adulthood. The sculpture acknowledges wartime losses among early surfers and provokes debates about representation, noting surfing's origins in 12th-century Polynesia and its local demonstration by three Hawaiian princes in 1885.
Read at The Mercury News
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