The World War I Memorial opened three years ago, but it wasn’t complete until the huge new sculpture was installed and lit up on Friday night.
The public got to see the ceremony on a Jumbotron at Freedom Plaza, while the VIP’s were at the World War I Memorial.
The sculptor, Sabin Howard, spoke about the massive amount of work to create the sculpture and how it is intended to represent the sanctity of humanity.
The relief is the longest free-standing bronze relief in the Western Hemisphere. It is 25 tons and 60 feet long.
After the ceremony, the World War I Memorial was open to the public.
The sculpture has 38 figures, slightly larger than life size. It tells the story of a soldier going to war and the aftermath of coming home.
Howard hired models for the figures, using current combat veterans to portray the soldiers, and took 12,000 photos of them. Many of the models were at the ceremony.
The sculpture took about 10 years from conception to unveiling. The work was cast in clay by Howard at his studio in New Jersey, then forged in England. It was privately financed, largely by donors who had some family connection to the war.
Living history
After Friday night’s ceremony, there were living history demonstrations at the memorial all weekend.
We previously wrote about the memorial in 2021 when it first opened. Since the sculpture would not be installed for three more years, a scrim was put up to show what the sculpture would look like.