Proposed Holocaust memorial rejected for San Diego’s Embarcadero

As real estate agents, San Diego brothers Mark and Frank Powell know the key to success: location, location, location.

As would-be public art donors, they’re learning that the same rule applies.

Their proposal for a Holocaust liberation memorial in Tuna Harbor Park on the Embarcadero has been rejected by a Port of San Diego arts advisory committee — an 8-0 ruling that underscores the city’s long and often stormy relationship with public art.

The Powells pitched their project as a memorial to Holocaust victims — including more than two dozen members of the brothers’ relatives — while honoring American servicemen who liberated Nazi death camps at the end of World War II. They also saw it as a nod to early military history in San Diego, which was an Army town before it was a Navy town.

They wanted to place it on a patch of grass in the shadow of the USS Midway Museum and next to “Unconditional Surrender,” the 25-foot-tall statue of a sailor kissing a nurse that’s loved by tourists and loathed by art aficionados.

The design features bronze sculptures of a half-dozen people, including soldiers, camp survivors and Army Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Allied commander who later became president. At its center is an 18-foot-tall piece of barbed wire — “the international symbol of oppression,” in Mark Powell’s words — being pulled down by one of the soldiers and one of the camp survivors.

“A lot of other memorials commemorate those who were killed,” Frank Powell said as the proposal was being unveiled publicly in August 2015. “We wanted a monument that shows strength, liberty and freedom.”

The Powells estimated the project would cost more than $1 million and pledged to raise the money through private donations. They collected letters of support from local congressional representatives, state legislators, San Diego City Council members, San Diego County supervisors and rabbis. They were hoping for quick approval from the port, which manages the state tidelands where the park sits.

But after a string of projects that brought San Diego ridicule in national public art circles, decision makers have sharpened their focus on aesthetics, put new evaluation procedures in place and are trying to move away from accepting donated projects just because they’re free or might be popular with the public.

Last fall, San Diego International Airport officials declined a $200,000 bronze sculpture of retired basketball great and philanthropist Bill Walton. While acknowledging Walton’s contributions to San Diego, the officials said the sculpture didn’t correspond with the focus on “commissioning original artworks that are seamlessly integrated into the airport environment.”

Now the Holocaust memorial is experiencing a similar fate, bumping up against a master plan that calls for “a critically acclaimed collection of public art that embodies the essence of the Port’s maritime, environmental and civic character.”

To the Powells, Tuna Harbor Park is the perfect location for their memorial.

It’s in an area that already houses what the port calls the “Greatest Generation Collection,” a half-dozen military-themed pieces that include the kiss statue; a tribute to entertainer Bob Hope and his USO tours; the USS San Diego memorial; the Battle of Leyte Gulf memorial; and “Homecoming,” a statue of a sailor, wife and child hugging.

Also nearby are the Midway Museum, a plaque honoring Pearl Harbor survivors and a storyboard that chronicles the role local tuna clippers played ferrying food and other supplies during World War II.

The Powells saw their project — known formally as the United States Military Liberation of Holocaust Survivors Memorial — as a bridge between the Leyte Gulf monument, which memorializes a legendary World War II naval battle in the Pacific, and the kiss statue, which celebrates the end of the war.

But what’s already there is part of what troubled the port’s Arts and Culture Advisory Committee, which reviewed the proposal on March 17 and voted unanimously against it.

Committee member Charles Reilly pointed to the kiss statue. “The monstrousness of the Holocaust deserves a place marked by reverence, introspection, stillness,” he said. “I have visited several Holocaust memorials, here and in Europe, and been moved to tears more than once. I simply could not picture the location working next to tour buses dropping off sightseers for quick photo ops and boisterous selfies at ‘Unconditional Surrender.’”

Committee member Anne Porter also said she was concerned that if the memorial was installed, it might have to be moved one day when Seaport Village is redeveloped.

“We all expressed regret because the Powells are committed to have this moment in history memorialized, and they put their own money and energy and passion behind it,” Porter said. “It just didn’t work for me in this particular location.”

Mark Powell said he and his brother started working on the proposal four years ago and have spent more than $20,000 on it. They consulted with Colorado-based sculptor Richard Arnold on the design.

The arts committee’s rejection “took the wind out of our sails,” Powell said. “It was depressing.”

On Friday, he said he would consult with other memorial backers before deciding what to do. Port officials have suggested he look for another location, perhaps at Fort Rosecrans, which has roots as an Army facility that date to the 1890s and is named after a brigadier general.

“They want to shove us to the side, put us in a corner,” Powell said. “We wanted to be in a place where students who go on field trips to the Midway could walk through the park and see it with all the other monuments there. Who is going to go see it in a cemetery?”

john.wilkens@sduniontribune.com

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