Contribute an Object

If you have a family member who has been taken due to gun violence, we invite you to participate in this exhibition by contributing an object of your loved one. By sharing a remembrance object that honors someone you love, together we can highlight the human toll of gun violence and inspire visitors to connect with the individual stories.

How to Contribute an Object:

STEP 1: Review the Contribution Criteria and FAQs within this website to help choose your remembrance object(s) and ensure that it will fit in a single brick of the Memorial. Photos will be scanned and printed at wallet size.

STEP 2: Please fill out the online Contribution Form. This form will ask a few questions about you, your loved one, and the object you’ve selected.

STEP 3: Sign the online Waiver for either a GIFT (your object is a permanent part of the Memorial), or LOAN (your object will be returned to you after the Memorial closes in Boston in January 2025).

After this information is submitted, we will be in contact to assist with your donation.

STEP 4: Stop by one of our Collection Events or bring to the MASS Design Group office in Boston to drop off your object with one of our Gun Violence Memorial Project team members.

STEP 5: Once we have received your remembrance object, it will be cataloged and installed in the memorial within 4-6 weeks.

Contribution Criteria

Because of the public nature of the exhibit, the physical constraints in brick size, and the commitment to generating productive and healing dialogue, remembrance objects will only be accepted if they meet the following criteria:

  • Are no more than three (3) individual objects total

  • Are no more than 9”L x 4.5” W x 3”H in size and must weigh less than 5 lbs combined. Photos must be 3.5”H x 5.5”W.

  • Are objects that are meaningful representations of your loved one’s passions or personality (photos can be included to compliment these objects)

  • Are the property or in the guardianship of the individual signing the waiver and releasing the object

  • Do not contain perishable, combustible, light-emitting, or highly-flammable substances

  • Do not include personal identifiable information, such as a phone number, mailing or email address

  • Do not contain malicious, threatening, illegal, graphic, abusive, offensive or otherwise inappropriate content, or promote or advocate illegal activity

  • Do not include names or images of perpetrators

  • Do not lead a viewer to experience mental, psychological, emotional or physical harm

Please note that the memorial team has curatorial capacity to determine if a contribution is appropriate for display.