In the days after Sept. 11, Jen Hickey (junior-integrative arts) was touched by the impromptu memorials that crystallized in New York and around the nation. She too found herself searching for "an outlet of emotion."

Within a week, she and other Penn State students in the arts started gathering to envision a creative, public way to commemorate those killed in the terror attacks.

On Sunday, nearly two months after the day, the student design group is inviting the public to help them assemble the memorial sculpture they conceived.

Students, professors and community members plan to link together nearly 5,000 foot-wide black banners and string them along chain fences in front of Pattee Library.

"They wanted a place where these panels would wave (in the wind) and be seen from a distance," said Jan Muhlert, director of the Palmer Museum of Art. "I think they've selected a perfect location."

The public art will flutter in the wind for seven days before organizers take it down.

Hickey said she and the dozen or so undergraduate and graduate designers discussed locations around campus and various materials before agreeing on the Mall and slices of low-cost waterproof landscaping fabric.

"It's very simple. It's not overly patriotic. It's more focused on the individuals," Hickey said of the sculpture design.

Sallie McCorkle, associate professor of visual arts and women's studies, who oversaw the student group's efforts, said the actual communal act of tying the black panels together is a performance side to the art.

Installation of the work will begin at 11 a.m. Sunday and could run for most of the day, McCorkle said.

On Saturday night or Sunday morning, the group will find out the most updated number of dead and missing from the attacks in New York, Washington, D.C., and Somerset County to decide how many banners to use in the artwork, she said.

The College of Arts and Architecture and the student designers paid for the project. Easy Gardener Inc., a Waco, Texas firm, also agreed to provide the landscaping material at a reduced price.

Muhlert said she appreciates the interactive and transient quality of the piece.

The idea of most memorials, she said, is to "keep the subjects being memorialized in the public's mind. Certainly this is one way of helping to do that, especially since people are invited to participate."

The student group at one time in the planning process had hoped to create something through which people could walk, but safety considerations prevented such a plan, Hickey said. Nonetheless, she said she's still happy with the design.