Posted on 05/04/2005 11:54:42 AM PDT by lizol
Bold, contentious Jewish memorial opens in Berlin
Wed May 4, 2005 11:28 AM ET
By Noah Barkin BERLIN (Reuters) - Berlin will unveil a haunting memorial to the murdered Jews of Europe next week after 17 years of charged debate and controversy over how Germany should remember the darkest chapter in its history.
Situated on a vast plot of land between the Brandenburg Gate and the buried remains of Adolf Hitler's bunker, the memorial has been hailed by supporters as a courageous symbol of Germany's readinesss to face up to its grim past.
Its detractors have slammed the design -- an open graveyard-like field of rectangular charcoal-gray pillars -- as ugly, overly abstract and a sitting duck for vandals.
The opening of the memorial on May 10 is unlikely to end a polemic that has raged in German political, religious and artistic circles since feisty journalist Lea Rosh began pushing for a monument to Jewish victims of the Nazis back in 1988.
"It is not self-evident for a nation to put a memorial in the center of its capital which recalls the worst acts, the most heinous crimes of its own history," said Wolfgang Thierse, German parliamentary president and a backer of the memorial.
"No one can say how this memorial will work, how it will be accepted and whether the criticism will end. I think the debate and the fights it gave rise to are bound to continue."
Designed by U.S. architect Peter Eisenman, the memorial consists of 2,711 pillars, which range in height from a few centimeters (inches) to 4.7 meters (15 feet) and form a dense grid pattern through which visitors can wander.
From a distance, the site looks like a dusky, placid ocean. As one descends on uneven, sloping ground into the memorial the concrete blocks grow more imposing, tilt at irregular angles, and street noise fades.
The experience is intended to create feelings of unease and loneliness, encouraging discussion on the plight of the 6 million Jews who died at the hands of the Nazi regime.
Eisenman views the field as a metaphor for the Nazi regime and the mad, ordered nature of its genocide.
"The field looks like it's reasonable, lined up," Eisenman said in an interview. "Then you find the stones are not perfectly horizontal or vertical. There is a warping sensation. It's unsettling. It seems reasonable from the outside but when you get into it it's out of control."
At the request of the government, the dark field of pillars has been complemented with an underground information center which documents, in highly personal fashion, the stories of individual Jews killed by the Third Reich. Reaching a consensus on the memorial's final shape has been a messy process replete with unexpected twists since former Chancellor Helmut Kohl backed the project in 1993.
Kohl rejected as impractical initial plans to build a 20,000 sq meter (yard) angled concrete surface on the site, containing the names of all the Jews who died in the Holocaust. He then insisted on changes to the Eisenman plan that prompted the architect's design partner, sculptor Peter Serra, to drop out.
In 2001, the memorial foundation was forced to pull down fund-raising posters which awkwardly tried to grab the attention of passers-by with the title "The Holocaust never happened."
And in October 2003, construction was briefly interrupted after it emerged that the parent of Degussa, the company supplying anti-graffiti protection for the memorial's pillars, provided Zyklon B gas pellets used in Nazi extermination camps.
Along this bumpy road, skeptics have questioned what the pillars have to do with the Holocaust, attacked the decision to put the memorial in its high-profile location and wondered aloud about why it is for the Jews and not other Nazi victims.
I think "indifferent" is a better word.
Naaaa....I like the word "disappointing" because that is exactly what I felt when I read her response.
Disappointing? What did you want me to do - vomit all over my keyboard? The photo was obviously placed here for shock value and I have seen it before.
"What did you want me to do - vomit all over my keyboard?"
Actually I was looking for a little humility and perhaps a dose of humbleness. It's not that much to ask for when people have been exterminated by the millions now is it?
"The photo was obviously placed here for shock value and I have seen it before."
Actually it was placed here to show just a small picture of what happened back then. I've seen photo's like that myself and have always responded with a heavey heart.
Humility for what? Because I disagree with something? The last time I checked the First Amendment still allows freedom of speech.
As far as posting the photo "to show just a small picture of what happened back then" I am not obtuse - we've all seen pictures from the concentration camps.
"The last time I checked the First Amendment still allows freedom of speech."
You are correct and if I had told you what I really wanted to say, we would have ended up in an ugly argument. Like I said before, humility is just as important as the First Amendment. Have a nice day.
I am still waiting to hear why I'm supposed to be humble...
Forget it. This conversation is going no where real fast.
It went no where a long time ago when you posted that picture in an attempt to induce guilt.
Once again you are wrong....I didn't post the picture!
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