I am back at home after an amazing initial visit to La Coupole as part of the Art of Remembrance project. It will take some time to process all of the things I experienced there from the archives, to the planetarium, to the technical museum and of course the architecture of the tunnels and the dome itself. I am always intrigued by the visible traces of history left, literally in this case, in the walls. One can still see in detail the grain of the planks of wood used as shuttering to hold poured concrete and in the tunnels the hammer marks from intense excavations. Forced labour was used throughout the site. Through the use of VR and other modern technologies, one can follow each stage of the journey of the missiles as they are moved throughout the site from the main entrance to the launch bay and wonder at the scale of this military industrial complex. History, memory, reality and imagination are brought together in a way that always acknowleges the human cost of this enterprise which not only changed the physical landscape of its locality but also severely impacted the lives of those who lived in and around it. Without knowing the outcome of my ongoing research, I hope I can play a part in bringing some of these forgotten stories into the present. As we know, forced labour, unspeakable cruelty and unchecked megalomania are not in the past. They are very much of the present moment. We should all hope they are not part of our future.
RSS Feed