bill hayward’s The American Memory Project

July 6, 2009

dr. lanny real bird – crow agency, montana

real_-bird©billhayward

Our language identifies who we are.  For the Crow our life doesn’t revolve around ownership of things…it is the ownership of our words.

July 1, 2009

“Humanity is not something man simply has…”

Humanity is not something man simply has. He must fight for it anew in every generation, and he may lose his fight.  Where…the uniqueness of his individual person? – Paul Tillich, “A Prefatory Note By Paul Tillich”, New Images of Man

June 19, 2009

The Work of Memory – Carter Ratcliff

Unbound by tradition, uninhibited by fear, each American is free to invent “an original relation to the universe,” or so said Ralph Waldo Emerson in 1836.  Since then, a uniquely American idea of self-creation has been reduced to its opposite, as we learn to define ourselves through consumerist choice in everything from art to politics.

The work of memory is to recall what has been lost.

Carter Ratcliff – art critic, author, poet

May 23, 2009

john goggin

John Goggin©billhayward

-motor vehicle operator-

boston national historical park

Having served in Vietnam, John is continually reminded of “what it must have been like to be at the battle that June day in 1775.” To find oneself directly connected to that string that stretches throughout history, that profundo note that reverberates forever in all who have been in battle. “Youʼre standing around and then all of a sudden itʼs, ʻOK, here we goʼ”.

May 13, 2009

We The People


May 12, 2009

jason shinder

jason-shinder©billhayward

ETERNITY – jason shinder

A poem written three thousand years ago

about a man who walks among horses
grazing on a hill under the small stars

comes to life on a page in a book

and the woman reading the poem,
in the silence between the words,

in her kitchen, filled, with a gold, metallic light,
finds the experience of living in that moment
so clearly described as to make her feel finally known

by someone — and every time the poem is read,

no matter her  situation or her age,
this is more or less what happens.

May 7, 2009

freedom – nyc

freedom_retouched©billhayward

-daughter of NYPD detective ann marie moloney-
world trade center site
new york, new york


Freedom was on the school bus on her way to school when she heard word of the World Trade Center attacks and collapse.  Knowing that her mother would be among  the first officers to go down to the site, her first reaction was as written. She had been told that her mother was probably dead.

May 5, 2009

What would you do?

brush10-copy©billhayward


given enough paint, paper and permission, there’s no telling where we might end up

May 3, 2009

Portraits of the Collaborative Self – The Process

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