What aesthetic discourse could one have about ruined culture picking up after years of aggression and war? Modern postwar landscapes are inevitably still at war, existing in a transformed urban sphere, struggling to restore normalcy as life regains its persuasive cycle within these distorted landscapes. The aesthetic and emotional quotients evoked from such dissonant imagery are quite dislocating. While devastation and irreconcilable tragedy are persistently conveyed through these ruins, they also start to exude a new kind of aura – a subliminal aura through which bullet holes and grenade indentations gradually become infused into new landscapes of restored life. Their presence becomes acceptable, and a feeling of nervous caution, perhaps even comfort, resonates from them, through the identification of one of the most vital of human instincts – that of survival.

Urbicide was completed in June of 2001, just months before 9/11. The short film accompanying the project premiered at the rooftop terrace of ABC No Rio gallery in NYC on the six month anniversary of 9/11. The very first installation of the Towers of Light beamed in the background, adding new pathos and context to the piece.