The Archive of You & I

The project originated as a personal inquiry into the relationship between identity, memory, and cemeteries in the cityscape for my undergraduate architectural dissertation. Upon completion, it evolved into a self-initiated branding project for the new institution. As a society, we cherish memories, hoping to be remembered via the marks we leave behind. These marks are often in the form of objects which form the focal points of cities and society; they become points of cultural orientation. We erect these monuments to commemorate greatness, but do they hold the same resonance for the ordinary person? How, then, are we remembered? The cemetery is the memory component in the structure of knowledge that is the city. It is the record-keeping unit of the city, the site where remembrance takes on a spatial form. It is an archive of sorts, accumulating stories and memories of the city's people within the confines of its high walls. In a society where the institution of death is evolving, can the role of this record-keeping unit evolve into a socio-cultural one? Can it bring value to the city beyond harboring memories merely through the physical remains of the body? Can cemeteries function as memorial landscapes where you and I find solace that we, too, are not forgotten?