the main thing that struck me the most was the way the architect narrates and expresses the tragedy in terms of architecture which is not loud but yet so striking to the viewer. the form of the building, the material usage and the expression of the event is so prominent yet subtle in language of architecture.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQ6SPYaiST8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OYlkSukgKI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2fKtlQ05A0
The concept of the design started from looking at the old jewish cemetaries which were old and not maintained well and yet stood at various parts of the city. the huge confidence in which the history projected itself even though the furute was blank and black as they were no jewish people of that blood line anymore. the usage of the void that appears in the design many times shows the spritual legacy.
The site which exists in a city which was a bomb site destroyed during the war and rebuilt in the 1960's next to the colegian house which is a classic baroque building which was a supreme court perviously and had a museum next to it half a century ago.the council decided to build a museum there in 1988 and it was given out as a competetion and daniel lebiskind's design won due to its sensitivity to the event and the expresssion.
Inspired by Walter Benjamin’s essay "One-way Street," a book of remembrance for the victims of the Holocaust, the invisible web of relationships between Jews and Germans, and the unfinished last act of Arnold Schoenberg’s opera "between the lines,"the building is the third act of the unfinished opera according to the architect.
The lines on the building which according to the architect represent the scars, gashes suffered by the jews to the dicontinued line in the form of voids which runs throughout the site end to end, lines in all its variety govern the building. I n spite of the force of expression, the movement is less arbitary than it might seem to appear. the trees existing on the site are kept intact and one tree especially changes the direction of the building. the lightening shape of the plan of the building is seen only from the sky. from the street level it looks like a simple building without clashing or outshining the baroque building next to it.nothing externally connect both these buildings yet the entrance is from the baroque building.
A large entrance with untreated concrete with sharp angles is the entrance to the museum from inside the baroque building.the idea that the staircase leads to the basement of the museum which is also the entrance to the museum and the staircase block cuts throught all the levels of the baroque building which is a big void which the user can see in the staircase represents the monstrous but hidden voilence. the way every line and form means something significant srtiked me the most.
The staircase leads to 3 intersecting corridors also called as the axes by the architect which represent the 3 principles of german judiasm. only 2 lines can be seen at any time at the axes.
1. continuity
2.exile
3.death
The line of continuity is the longest line leading to a staircase which is linear and the same width as the axes line plced between two linear walls it leads to all the floors of the museum and acends upward and the perspective is peirced by beams at various levels showing the struggle of the jews to the light of the day.
The other 2 axes have are used as exhibtion areas where the architect has designed cabinets for display of objects. simple ones which are the souveneirs of the jewish people who were murdered reminding people of them.
The axes of death as called as the axis of holocaust ends at a black door which opens into a concrete void which can be seen on the exterior of the building.the void is empty and represents the end or death. this is the only void which can be seen on the exterior too. the idea was to make the tower of holocaust( the end) seen to the world outside.
The axes of the exile on the other hand opens into the open air on the outside where the architect has designed a square pedestal garden where the floor tilts at 10 degree at each end and has long concrete pillars in which trees are placed. it represents the struggle even in the exile as the user needs some effort to walk through them and the only exit is back into the basement therough the axes.
the idea of trees being placed in the concrete casing was to show the uprooting.the compactness at which the coloumns are placed and the tilt of the floor makes the user feel like in exile.
there are 6 bare concrete blocks which the architect calls the voids which run from one end to another of the building peircing through it.these voids represent and remind the user the absence of the jewish people today in the german society. they cannot be seen on the exterior at all except on the skylight where the last one is just a vanishing line representing the fading away of the final figure of german judaism-absence.the voids are a refusal to give way to nostalgia and only the primary one has acess to it in which the user can walk through. the floor is lined with small mateal cut outs of the sad faces of the victims and it is called as the void of memory.
the exteror zinc cladding was with the purpose of change with time. and the gashes or lines on the building which act as openings for light into the building in a dramatic pattern to represent the gashes, scars left of the german jewish society in the history. the architect actually took a map of present day germany and linked adresses of the bearucrats and the jewish people killed and then superimposed the pattern on the form of the building to create the hapazard lines on the building.
The study of this building helped me to understand the principle of designing a memorial in which every line, form and opening means something and the whole experience of the building should remind or show the person the event.A true understanding of the event, location of the building and also the context in which it placed and how a viewer would perceive it is also a important issue while designing a memorial. here in the case of the museum the architect uses the space to nattate the event and remind the user through the journey through the building.
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