Absence

by J. Meejin Yoon

Both a book and a sculptural object, ABSENCE is a memorial to the twin towers of the World Trade Center. At almost two pounds, ABSENCE has a considerable physical presence, but it is in every way the ghost of a presence, and it is this ghostliness that gives it its particular emotional weight. A solid white block of thick stock cardboard pages, the book’s "text" consists of one pinhole and two identical squares die-cut into each of its one-hundred-and-twenty pages – one for each story of the towers including the antenna mast. These removed elements lead the reader floor by floor through the missing buildings towards the final page where the footprint of the entire site of the World Trade Center is die-cut into a delicate lattice of absent structures. The simplicity of Yoon’s materials and her use of repetition speak, without words, about unspeakable loss. At the same time, as a scale model of a vanished architectural site, it operates on a larger cultural level by commemorating the site itself.

120 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004