space when we presented perspectives of the proposed design interventions. We developed these as montage images using site photographs as the base layer, thus providing a clear reference to specific places with which they could already identify. Still, in each of these cases, the viewer was removed from the actual place of habitation. Referencing the Illumination event, we understood that a physical occupation of the site holds greater potential for affecting the entire body precept, stimulating experiential memory, and generating a more tangible spatial association. We were fortunate to be able to stage our fourth and most recent public meeting within the park adjacent to our cemeteries, the place of our initial Illumination introduction. Visible from a primary neighborhood street, the event caught the attention of a greater public – we enjoyed an attendance twice as large as any previous meeting. Not only were we physically located in and adjacent to our focus sites, but the new content presented at the meeting included a pair of full scale models, design options for a cemetery wall that is an integral component of our proposed intervention addressing the public realm. The design and construction of these mock-up cemetery walls had been the focus of a constructions exploration course at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, College of Architecture and Design. The course had been predicated on enhancing opportunities for students to engage with communities through the construction of small scale interventions. Their involvement in the public presentation added a new dimension to the conversational dynamic. The students represented an intermediate voice, neither novice nor expert, that was automatically more accessible. Their research and construction work on the site had given them a degree of familiarity that became apparent as they described each of the proposals. Their enthusiasm was infectious.
Community dialogue after their presentations lasted a full thirty minutes and continually referenced the projected execution of the interventions on site with adamant specificity that comes with true knowledge of the landscape. The physical entities of the walls themselves provided measure through which the public could consider their own spatial relationships. Many of the underlying performance criteria presented