Henry Harding - Originality in Art

For my image, I chose Maya Lin's competition entry for the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington D.C. Her design, unlike other entries, was based on a series of simple, soft, pastel sketches that emphasized the monument's minimalist qualities. Her design is the epitome of originality because it began with her own personal thought. The memorial is made of two black granite walls, positioned in a symbolic 125 degree V (vietnam), that sinks into the ground at its vertex. Lin chose the stone because of its reflective qualities so that when the viewer looks at the names of the dead American soldiers engraved into the stone, they see their own reflection, which was supposed to symbolically bring the past and present together. She effectively captures her own idea, and for that, her art is completely original.