Jury citation
Victorian Family Violence Memorial is a gentle gesture in solidarity. It straddles two fulcrums: it is a place for the individual or for a group to gather in support, grief or remembrance. This duality in function takes shape as a moulding of the earth, guiding visitors into the heart and then out again. Splitting the ground plane, the level changes create an inconspicuous amphitheatre, and a place to sit in reflection under the canopy of an existing tree.
The monument holds the earth as if to bear the weight of the subject matter, delicately balanced in a moment in time. Steel buttresses appear to vanish into a point of darkness, their pared-back filigree personifying the immeasurable number of victims. A poetic expression of what we see and what we don’t see, the work manifests a sculptural gracefulness where every touchpoint has meaning.
Landscape serves as a living reminder of the reason for gathering in this place, with purple flowers alluding to the global movement to end family violence. Country is embodied by a smoking vessel; the burnt embers and ashes are captured and fall back to earth in a continual gesture of blessing.
With elegant simplicity, this monument holds space as a place to be still and to remember.
Victorian Family Violence Memorial is located in East Melbourne, Victoria, on Wurundjeri Country, and was reviewed by Georgia Birks in Architecture Australia September/October 2022.
Project credits
Architect: Muir and Openwork; Project team: Alessandro Castiglioni, Amy Muir, Liz Herbert, Marijke Davey, Mark Jacques, Toby McElwaine; Builder: Multipro Civil Construction; Indigenous Advisor: Sarah Lynn Rees; Structural engineer: WSP; Irrigation consultant: Tenburren Irrigation; Lived-experience stakeholder: Victim Survivors’ Advisory Council; Traditional Custodians and cultural advisor: Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung Cultural Heritage Aboriginal Corporation, Boon Wurrung Foundation, Bunurong Land Council Aboriginal Corporation; “Taken Not Given” memorial stakeholder: Forced Adoption Practices and artist Anne Ross; Consultant: Department of Premier and Cabinet, Office for Women, City of Melbourne.
