Judisches Museum
Berlin
Daniel Libeskind 1999
Histrionic zinc-clad forms create an ‘iconic‘ identity for
Daniel Libeskind’s Judisches (Jewish) Museum in Berlin, yet this intensity is
dissipated inside, where prosaic displays sit awkwardly within the fragmented
interior. Is it a shortcoming of the
museum building or the display that makes a visit to this museum so
frustrating?
Divergent agendas for the architect and the curators appear
to lie at the root of the problem – the architecture is fractured and
contorted, arguably giving concrete expression to the horror and loss of the
Holocaust, whereas the display depicts the continuity of 2000 years of Jewish
history in Germany and emphasises the quotidian life and contribution to
society of the increasingly acculturated Jewish community. The problem is that ordinariness is a
narrative lacking in drama, which is why the ‘voids’ that Libeskind has left in
the building speak so eloquently of the loss and the absence of those whose lives
were brutally interrupted. These compressed
vertical spaces, dimly lit and claustrophobic, are intensely beautiful.
Entry to the museum is through the adjacent 19th
century villa, which contains (heavy) security, cloaks, tickets and a
cafe. Dark stairs drop down from inside
the villa to the lower level of the new building, a disorientating sloping
floor and a series of angled intersecting corridors with harsh fluorescent
lighting. Disorientation turns to irritation
when displays can only be viewed by one person at a time standing directly in
front of a clear circle within the fritted glass. Wall surfaces are dry-lined, a finish lacking
in appropriate substance. Each of the
three corridors is a thematic axis representing Holocaust, Exile and Continuity. These axes culminate respectively in a
tomb-like ‘void’, a tilted garden of concrete blocks and willows (Eisenmann’s 2005
Holocaust Memorial, also in Berlin is very reminiscent of this space - blogpost
15.05.12) and stairs up to the remainder of the display. The ‘Continuity’ display is on a linear route
and follows the fragmented Star of David geometry that generates the form of
the building. This geometry cannot be
perceived and the lack of choice, as the route leads inexorably on through an
awkward succession of display tableaux, is increasingly alienating.
In one of the voids an evocative installation by Menashe
Kadishman (blogpost 07.06.12) responds to both the difficult content of the
museum and to the architecture. Like
some of the most brilliant buildings, the Jewish Museum is at once highly
polemical and deeply flawed, but this lends it intensity. Can the mute expression of architecture and
art transcend the inadequacy of the conventional museum display? However eloquent the architecture, the
stridency of the interior compounds the fumbling inadequacy of the exhibition design. This important story deserves a better account.
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