Tribute in Light
The Towers of Light is temporary art installation of 88 searchlights placed next to the site of the World Trade Center to create two vertical columns of light in remembrance of the September 11, 201 Terrorist Attack from March 11 to April 14, 2002.
The various people who ended up working together on the project simultaneously came up with idea in the week following the attack.
Architects John Bennett and Gustavo Bonevardi of PROUN Space Studio distributed their "Project for the Immediate Reconstruction of Manhattan's Skyline".
Artists Julian LaVerdiere and Paul Myoda, who before September 11 were working on the 91st floor of the World Trade Center north tower on a proposed light scupture on the giant radio antenna with Creative Time, conceived the project "Phantom Towers", and were commissioned by The New York Times Magazine an image of the project for its September 23 cover.
Richard Nash Gould, a New York architect, went to the Municipal Art Society with the concept. On September 19, chairman Philip K. Howard wrote to Mayor Rudy Giuliani, asking him "to consider placing two large searchlights near the disaster site, projecting their light straight up into the sky."
External links and references
From 88 Searchlights, an Ethereal Tribute, The New York Times, March 4, 2002
Filling the Void, The New York Times Magazine, September 23, 2001
For, Now, How About A Monument of Light?, New York Post, September 20, 2001