Through the Eyes of Artists

Carol Pulin admires the memorial to the victims of the Oklahoma City bombing, its field of empty chairs all facing in one direction, small chairs for children, larger ones for adults. But that is a memorial for 168 people, says Ms. Pulin — a number that is easier to grasp than the approximately 3,000 killed in the September 11 attacks. A September 11 memorial would require a different approach.

So Ms. Pulin, director of the American Print Alliance, in Peachtree, Ga., put out a request to members of her organization to submit entries for a show that would travel throughout the country for several years, then be donated to a major museum or a library print collection.

The artwork would memorialize the victims in whatever way the artist

thought appropriate. All entries had to be original works of art, she said.

“Among the victims are people of all races, ages, faiths, and at least 80 nationalities,” she wrote in her instructions to the artists. “Some artists might imagine a portrait of an ‘average’ or composite person, others might depict a scene of everyday life, a landscape. The idea is to commemorate individual lives rather than relive the acts of terror.”

At least 425 prints, drawings, photographs, and other works, including this piece by Kenneth Kerslake of Gainesville, Fla., have been submitted and more are expected.

The show will open September 11 at Thomas Hospital in Fairhope, Ala., then will continue to travel around the United States and Canada.

“The works of art that the artists submitted are exceptional,” she says. “Some are very simple, others amazingly complex, all heartfelt.”