Art410: Post #17

In response to The Eiffel Tower by Roland Barthes...

I think this article was one of the most interesting articles we had to read during the semester, it made me think from a different perspective on the way people view monuments. Instead of seeing, for example, the Golden Gate as something phenomenal, I imagined having to cross it every morning during rush hour. The bridge would most definitely lose some of its credibility for me in that circumstance, I would begin associating it with hours of traffic and high costs for crossing it. I was also intrigued when I read that "theres nothing to see in the tower, its empty, yet it still stirs up a crowd every year (p. 5-6)." How can something be so incredibly popular among the world, yet be completely useless? Sure the tower must have a beautiful view of Paris, must look amazing when lit up at night, and just simply gigantic but is this why people care about it so much? People must have an emotional attachment with the tower or associate it with something of great honor for Italy. Maybe what makes a monument or memorial long lasting is creating a significant presence that people can connect with, even if the monument/memorial is useless in reality.