Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe (Holocaust Memorial)

MEMORIALS

Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe

Type: Physical memorial
Alternative name: Holocaust Memorial
Location: Berlin
Country: Germany
Creator: Peter Eisenman
Dedication year: 2005

Added: 8/31/2009
Updated: 1/26/2014 10:40:44 PM

The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe (Denkmal für die ermordeten Juden Europas, or simply Holocaust-Mahnmal in German), designed by American architect Peter Eisenman, was dedicated on May 10 2005 in central Berlin. The memorial is located 100 meters away from Berlin´s main architectonical symbol, the Brandenburger Gate, on a 19.073 m2 large field. It is composed of 2.711 stelae in high quality grey beton. Each stele is 0,95 m wide and 2,38 m long. The height varies from 4,7 m down to 0,2 m. There are no inscriptions on the stelae. An underground information center at the eastern side of the field houses an information centre and an exhibition about the Holocaust which includes records from the Yad Vashem database about 3.5 millions of the Jews that were killed in the Holocaust.

The history of the memorial dates back to 1988 when the publisher Lea Rosh took the initiative to build a Holocaust-memorial in Berlin. A competition was made in 1994 but the winning proposal was not well received by the German Government, which however decided to continue the work by initiating a second contest in 1997. In 1999 the jury decided to give the commission to architect Peter Eisenman and in 2003 the building started.

Further reading:
The Memorial to Europe´s Murdered Jews has opened
More images from The Memorial to Europe´s Murdered Jews
Memorials are after all only symbolic works of art: on the controversies regarding the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin
Holocaust Memorial: architect Peter Eisenman, berlin 2005, by Sarah Quigley

POSTED BY JON BRUNBERG ON 8/31/2009