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29 mins ago Canada By Christopher Guly /Special to The Ukrainian Weekly | 29 mins ago

OTTAWA The design for a Victims of Communism memorial in Ottawa submitted by Ukrainian Canadian architect Wiktor Moskaliuks team topped one independent poll as the public favorite, but didnt fare as well in a survey led by the Canadian government, which likely gave the design of another team, without a Ukrainian connection, the edge in winning the competition.

On May 17, the Canadian government announced that a five-person jury it assembled had selected the design by a team led by Toronto architect Paul Raff. Called Arc of Memory, Team Raffs concept involves a sculptural array of more than 4,000 bronze rods arranged along 365 stainless steel fins configured into a gigantic arc, and is intended as a dynamic living calendar that would commemorate moments of suffering and injustice that eventually resolve into reflection and gratitude, according to a news release by Canadian Heritage, the government department that oversaw the design competition.

Mr. Moskaliuks team included Washington, D.C.-based Ukrainian American architect Larysa Kurylas and landscape architect Claire Bedat, also based in the U.S. capital.

Based on the results of an online Canadian Heritage poll, conducted in March and after the winning design was revealed, Team Raff scored the highest in overall favorability with 23 percent; Team Moskaliuk received 14 percent, or the second-lowest score among the five competing firms.

The results are based on a regionally and linguistically representative sample of 500 of the 717 surveys received.

However, in an earlier Canadian Broadcasting Corp. (CBC) online survey, 1,954 out of 5,183 votes cast, or 38 percent of respondents, chose Team Moskaliuks design and put it in the top position. Team Raff received 440 votes, or 8.5 percent of the total, putting its design in last position.

Team Raffs design is a sculpture and not a memorial, Mr. Moskaliuk commented in a telephone interview from Toronto.

Photos of Team Raffs design appear on the Canadian Heritage website (http://canada.pch.gc.ca/eng/1488208623937), along with a statement that describes the concept as a dynamic living calendar, designed to capture the many, many moments of suffering and injustice to be commemorated, in solace and in gratitude.

Each of the bronze rods in the memorial will point to a unique angle of the sun, for every hour of every day, across a year divided in the middle at the winter solstice, the darkest of the year, inviting visitors to step through in a metaphorical journey from darkness and oppression to lightness and liberty.

Team Moskaliuks design, which had no official title, was intended to focus on the memorials subtheme of Canada as a land of refuge, by focusing on the four principles of democracy equality, freedom, justice and representation depicted in four spire-like pillars made of white granite at the core of the monument to be situated in what is known as the Garden of the Provinces and Territories, west of Parliament Hill in Ottawa.

Reached by phone in Washington, Ms. Kurylas said she was very disappointed in her teams loss, and described Team Raffs sculpture as very intriguing. But she also believes her groups effort better reflected the thematic victims-of-communism connection to the subject of this memorial.

Team Moskaliuks proposed monument of four granite pillars was to be set at the center of a contemplative oval space symbolizing Canadian sanctuary for hundreds of thousands of refugees from communist regimes, according to the groups design-intent statement.

The oval space symbolizes Canada as a land of refuge, and the four pillars at the center embody the democratic ideals that refugees from communist regimes sought out, said Ms. Kurylas, whose design for the Holodomor Memorial to Victims of the Ukrainian Famine-Genocide of 1932-1933 in Washington was chosen from among 45 entrants.

Our memorial was unique in the bunch because it created a space in addition to creating an object.

Vox populi had a different take on the competing bids.

In its online survey, Canadian Heritage asked respondents to provide up to three adjectives that describe their impressions of each of the five designs.

The three most popular words for Team Moskaliuk were boring, dull and uninspiring, as ranked by level of frequency. For Team Raff, the results were interesting, beautiful and powerful.

With a team effort that involved more than 500 hours to pull together the design concept, Mr. Moskaliuk said he is done submitting bids for memorials. Its too labor intensive and costs a fortune, he explained.

Canadian Heritage reimbursed his team a small honorarium to cover travel costs to Ottawa and the printing of the design proposal the amount of which Mr. Moskaliuk declined to identify.

Mr. Moskaliuk expects to receive a debrief from Canadian Heritage officials some time next month as to why his team didnt make the final cut for the Victims of Communism memorial.

Ms. Kurylas said that design competitions are hard on entrants.

You cannot make a career of creating memorials, she observed. There is just too much emotional involvement in it, and it cant become production-line work.

She wont rule out designing another memorial, if hired to do so.

Ms. Kurylas acknowledged the nature of any design competition, that only one entrant ends up being selected.

I sincerely feel that if another project had addressed the theme better than ours, I would be taking it less hard, she said.

The Victims of Communism memorial, which will cost $3 million (Canadian, about $2.2 million U.S.) to build, is scheduled for completion next year.

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Team Moskaliuk loses competition to design Victims of Communism memorial - The Ukrainian Weekly (press release) (subscription)