Fairfax County has taken another step forward in the process of creating a permanent COVID-19 memorial. ArtsFairfax and the Fairfax County Arts Committee unanimously appointed two artists, Miriam Gusevich and Salvatore Pirrone, to create the memorial.
Both have ties to area universities. Gusevich was a Catholic University of America professor in DC, and Pirrone teaches at Marymount University in Arlington.
The memorial, entitled Circles of Memory, will honor victims of the pandemic as well as frontline health care workers, county staff, nonprofits, and first responders. It will be located at the Herrity Building and Public Safety Headquarters at 12055 Government Center Pkwy., Fairfax.
Gusevich is a Cuban American environmental artist and architect who lives in DC and has worked on several memorial projects, including the Jane Addams Memorial in Chicago. Pirrone is an American artist, designer, and educator who lives in Upper Marlboro. Gusevich lives in DC, and Pirrone lives in Upper Marlboro, Maryland.
“We need memorial spaces and artworks to help us appreciate the bonds we share as human beings,” said ArtsFairfax president and CEO Linda Sullivan. “With such artworks, engagement invites us to learn from our pain and redouble our efforts to lift up each other every day, not just in emergencies.”
The proposed memorial will be a 27-foot-tall, slender, hollow concrete cone with a break in the center and an oculus on top, through which visitors can view the sky. Visitors will be able to sit inside the structure and on benches nearby. This space is intended to serve as a place for contemplation.
“We hope to provide an environment that will bring people together. The memorial strives to be a place of reverence for the lives lost and the people who honor them,” Pirrone said.
This project has been in the works in Fairfax since February 2022, when chairman Jeff McKay instructed county officials to being looking into the logistics of planning a COVID-19 memorial.
“The county knows that everyone has been affected by COVID-19 in some way or another and knows these impacts will be with the community forever,” the official summary of the Board of Supervisors meeting on February 8, 2022, stated.
As of August 22, 2023, Fairfax County has had 273,842 reported cases of COVID-19 and 1,794 COVID-related deaths, according to data from the Virginia Department of Health.
The project will take “several months” to complete, according to ArtsFairfax.
Feature image of Miriam Gusevich (left) and Salvatore Pirrone (right), courtesy ArtsFairfax
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