911 Story Sign Art with 4 Signs

From the four actual photographs (above) that she took on her trips around the nation, San created an original version of SIGN ART to represent

• the four planes;

• the two towers with one breaking down;

• the reaction of emergency vehicles;

• the removal of debris at ground zero and the other sites with an upward arrow of hope and rebuilding; and

• the 9mi and the 11% numbers, bookend this image and relate it to 9/11

The colors red, orange, yellow, and green represent stop, slow down, caution, and go forward respectively. These four sign art images put in order the events of 9/11 and help us comprehend what took place and move beyond.

San's current project is simply entitled: 11up, as a tribute to the events of 911, Project 11up is several large concrete installation sculptures that will be placed in 11 cities across the United States. San perceives these forms as skeletal and roadways as vascular. She talks about her vision connecting 911 with rebuilding a nation:

Immediately after the disaster, I was forced to drive instead of fly from Naples, Florida, to Chicago, Illinois. As I passed the airport outside Atlanta, Georgia, I was struck by the uncanny silence of the skies. The absence of air traffic clashed with the unusually heavy road traffic, while all around me I saw road construction, storm drains, sewer pipes, and concrete forms lying on their sides. The landscape reminded me of a connecting spinal column with people moving and flowing in a vein-like framework. I found the experience quite eerie and I reacted physically and emotionally to feeling this. The skies were empty, yet ground life went on with greater fervor: people driving long distances to rebuild our life blood. So therefore, the new sculptures made out of the foundation walls of the WorldTradeCenter site, now coming out of the ground is like the rebuilding of our nation.  These concrete forms are like the ‘backbone of our nation’.  San Priest