Jury comments: The effect of this singular, precise sculptural object is powerful and immediate, its form essential. The vault carves out a chapel-like chamber, inviting moments of reflection on a busy street corner. It memorializes MIT police officer Sean Collier without being too literal. While its form is solid, whole, and seemingly simple, the memorial embodies many layers of meaning and work, synthesizing thoughtful input from the community; hours of software development, fabrication, and construction; and a city’s shared experience. The structure, though born out of a single moment in time, offers visitors endless ways to experience it, with its solids and voids, shifting spaces, changing with the weather, and meeting the needs of whoever might encounter it. The Collier Memorial is a total and complete project, converting the memory of tragedy into a spiritual work of art.
Client: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Consultants: Suffolk Construction; AHA Consulting Engineers; Francesca Bolognini; Feldman Land Surveyors; G&C Concrete Construction; Gaston Electrical Co.; Marianna Gonzalez; Hanover Pavers; Hayward Baker; Horton Lees Brogden Lighting Design; James W. Flett Co; .Corentin Fivet; Anna Kaertner; Knippers Helbig Advanced Engineering; Liberty Construction; Cecile Lu; McPhail Associates; MIT Construction Management Team; Nitsch Engineering; Ochsendorf DeJong and Block Consulting Engineers; Phoenix Bay State Construction Company; William Plunkett; Quarra Stone Company; Richard Burck Associates; RSE Associates; Sean Collier Permanent Memorial Committee; Valleycrest Landscape Development; Virginia Mist Group; Euipoom Estelle Yoon
