Memorials

By Laura Mincer*

In an essay soon to be published, the Franco-Bulgarian art historian and scholar Neli Dobreva subjects the 9/11 memorials in New York to rigorous criticism (not without reason). A criticism also due to their, more or less evident, use of models of representation of the Shoah. Dobreva argues (not without reason) that this leads to anesthesia and abuse. Is it really so? Or should we not consider the fact that it is apparently impossible to describe catastrophes and traumas without a reference to what, in all parts of the world, is considered the epitome of evil, one of ours, so to speak, “victory “?

*Historian of Poland, University of Genoa