Peter Eisenman Building Germany's Holocaust Memorial

Streaming video - 2014

This documentation chronicles Peter Eisenman's creation of a major public sculpture in the center of Berlin, a soccer-field sized space filled with 2711 concrete stele. The stele are of varying heights, tipping to the left and right on a shifting, undulating ground, reminiscent of a wheat field tossed by strong winds. Access to the field is through a grid of narrow walkways barely 3 feet wide, just enough for one person to pass through. In the beginning sculptor Richard Serra was Eisenman's design partner, but he left the project when it became clear that many compromises would have to be made on the way to the realization. The site is named "Memorial for the Murdered Jews of Europe." The idea of a memorial was initiate...d by a group of concerned Germans led by the journalist Lea Rosh in 1988, who demanded a visible public acknowledgement of that dark episode in their country's past. In 1998, after many years of debate and two design competitions, Chancellor Helmut Kohl opted for Peter Eisenman's entry. Kohl lost an election soon thereafter, but the project came to life again in the Schroder administration and was funded by the Bundestag (parliament) in 1999. This crucial funding vote, with support across party lines was a courageous step by the representatives of the German people. The building of the memorial meant an official acceptance of the fact that a former elected government of Germany had committed genocide against the Jews of Europe. The mission of the memorial is to honor the victims and keep alive the memory of the crimes of the Hitler years for future generations. It was important to place the memorial in a prominent place in the center of the German capital, where the Nazis had planned the genocide. Eisenman succeeded brilliantly in the face of controversy and critique, most of which vanished with the dedication of the memorial in May 2005. We invited prominent German politicians, literati, academicians as well as general visitors to comment on their feelings and impression on the memorial. Eisenman deserves special credit for keeping his design of the monument free of any traces of Kitsch. more