Big changes to Eisenhower Memorial

WASHINGTON -- Architect Frank Gehry and his design team proposed changes yesterday to the Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial planned for a site near the National Mall after hearing complaints from Ike's family for months.

The family had said the design focuses too much on Eisenhower's humble Kansas roots, rather than his accomplishments.

Members of the Eisenhower Memorial Commission held a public meeting to review the changes and said they were nearing a resolution to seek final approval of Gehry's concept.

Gehry has proposed a memorial park that would be framed with large metal tapestries showing a Kansas landscape to evoke Eisenhower's boyhood home in Abilene, Kan. At the center of the park, Gehry is replacing large images in stone reliefs with statues about 9 feet tall, showing Ike as a World War II hero and as president.

In a letter to the commission, Gehry explained the changes. He couldn't attend because his firm designed the set for the Los Angeles Philharmonic's production of "Don Giovanni," opening Friday.

"How do you represent a man of such towering achievement whose modesty was one of his core values?" Gehry wrote. "I have refined the design to incorporate this feedback, which I believe helps tell the story of Eisenhower with more dignity and more power."

The statues would depict Gen. Eisenhower with the 101st Airborne Division before the D-Day invasion of Normandy, France, in World War II.

Eisenhower as president would be depicted with his hand on a globe, inspired by a Yousuf Karsh photograph titled "The Elder Statesman."

"After careful consideration, I believe that the sculptures bring the story to life in a more powerful and accessible way than the bas reliefs were able to do," Gehry wrote, reversing his early rejection of statues.