The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe has been finished in 2005, about 15 years after the initial idea of German journalist Lea Rosh.
The project designed by architect Peter Eisenman and engineer Buro Happold, consists of 2,711 concrete slabs places on the area of 19,000 square meter (4.7 acre).
The slabs, called ’steale’ by the designer are in the box shape, about 2 m long and of various height. They are spread irregularly around the site without a visible pattern,
“designed to produce an uneasy, confusing atmosphere, and the whole sculpture aims to represent a supposedly ordered system that has lost touch with human reason” according to Eisenman’s project.
Besides later additions of statues representing non-Jewish victims of the Holocaust, the original idea does not include any of visible symbols, and no inscriptions describing the monument’s idea. Some explanation is covered by the underground “Place of Information” site, which holds the names of all known Jewish Holocaust victims, obtained from the Israeli museum Yad Vashem.
Over the years of preparation and development the project became the subject to large criticism.
Undermined was even the idea of the monument itself, as for example German novelist Martin Walser spoke against ‘monumentalizing of national shame’, as holocaust does need no monuments. Many of the Jewish did not want to have another memorial, especially that the Berlin one has been built on the place occupied during the Second World War by SS barracks.
As the addition it was pointed out that the building process involved some German companies, who were active during the War.
On the other hand, the he monument has been criticized for only commemorating the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, this has been addressed by creation of several corner statues, that are to represent other nations.
In spite of criticism the Holocaust Memorial exists and makes a big impression according to the words of the visitors, and anyone after seeing the Memorial can reach their own conclusions.
[photo courtesy of Wolfgang Staudt]
