Cape Town - The winning design for the proposed memorial to honour more than 1 600 black servicemen who died during World War I was announced by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC).
Dean Jay, of Dean Jay Architects, broke out in sobs after being named the winner of the CWGC Cape Town Memorial architectural design competition by acclaimed architect Sir David Adjaye at the Cape Institute for Architecture on Thursday.
“It’s a huge honour on so many levels,” he said, taking a moment to gain composure.
“I was a war veteran, I was on the wrong side but we didn’t know. When you’re in war, you don’t know the wrongs until after it’s finished. It’s one of the unique things of war, you’re told or convinced that your side is the right side and I’m just anti-war personally.”
The memorial will be erected in the Company’s Gardens, Cape Town, and will list the names of the 1 666 servicemen. Jay said it was important to have a single marker for each of the servicemen.
“It was quite a challenge to give that, if I may say, equal recognition, in a very constrained space and that’s why we had to make the insertions quite understated but powerful,” Jay said.
The CWGC received 56 entries after launching the competition in May.
Adjaye, who was appointed as CWGC artistic advisor to oversee all future monuments, said the decision to award the project to Jay was unanimous.
“What we (the judges) loved about the winner was that he understood the dignity of the issue but had a kind of incredibly poetic simplicity but a profound impact.”
Each marker will consist of a QR code to locate the individual markers from anywhere in the world.
CWGC external relations director Liz Woodfield said another round of public participation would take place with final designs submitted for the City and Heritage Western Cape.
“This is a redress project in many respects. We have 1 600 names which were found in South African archives by accident about five years ago or so and we know very little about these men. We are now trying to find out some of their stories, and we’re working with a company here in Cape Town to do some grassroots research. So we hope that it will bring recognition for this group of people,” she said.
shakirah.thebus@inl.co.za