Prague Journal

Monday, February 28, 2005

After an opulent breakfast buffet, Veena and Sarah joined Rick and me for an excursion to the Jewish Museum, which opened on September 9, 2001. The museum was designed by Daniel Liebeskind, the same architect who got the World Trade Center commission. The building was actually completed in 1999, and between February of that year and February of 2001, over 350,000 people visited the empty structure. Many argued that the building should be left empty as a memorial to those killed in the Holocaust, despite the fact that a museum by definition includes a collection. Some condemned the architecture, describing it as “a built horror” or as being “like a wounded animal,” while others have praised it, and in fact, it won the German national architecture prize. The design is based on a rather involved floor plan which provides connecting lines between locations of historic events and locations of Jewish culture in Berlin. These lines form a basic outline and structure for the building. Liebeskind also used the concepts of absence, emptiness, and the invisible—expressions of the disappearance of Jewish culture in the city—to design the building. These concepts are evoked by kinked and angled forms throughout the building, orchestrated to allow the visitor to see, but not enter, certain empty rooms, which Libeskind terms ‘voided voids.’ The ideas which generate the plan of the building repeat themselves on the surface of the building, where voids, windows, and perforations form a sort of cosmological composition on an otherwise undifferentiated, zig-zagging zinc surface. Libeskind derived the folded shape of the museum from many sources including lines on a map of Berlin connecting important sites in the Jewish cultural history of the city. The windows bear no relationship to the division of floors within the building; the single window above the Holocaust Void (tower), a concrete, freestanding structure connected underground to the museum, is the only source of light for the empty, unheated interior of the tower. The building itself stirs emotion, from the stark meeting of the zinc-paneled exterior and the sky and the sharp incisions of windows, to the haunting Garden of Exile and Emigration, in front of the south facade of the museum. Forty-nine concrete columns stand at an incline, with trees planted inside. Forty-eight columns, filled with Berlin earth, stand for 1948, the year the nation of Israel was born. The 49th column, filled with earth from Jerusalem, stands for Berlin. http://fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/resource/gallery/BJM1.htm
Inside, two Millennia of German Jewish History are related in 14 Sections. The permanent exhibition offers visitors a journey through German-Jewish history and culture, from its earliest testimonies – a decree from the year 321 issued by Emperor Constantine to the Cologne municipal authorities, through the Middle Ages and up to the present. The museum is still collecting mementos from Jewish families, to show insights into German-Jewish life through personal documents and objects, and to make one more aware of the destruction of Jewish property and cultural artifacts, which occurred during National Socialism. A large proportion of the exhibits are loan items either from other museums or private collections, as well as the many replica and reproduction items on display. The exhibition designers, Würth and Winderoll, have adeptly used artifacts to show the multifaceted culture of the Jews and to make the destruction and dissemination of the Holocaust both visible and tangible. The contrast, between the confined spaces crammed with artifacts and information at the beginning of the exhibition, and the sparse, cold-seeming and bare areas which deal with the Holocaust, is stark. By using a minimum of exhibits in this area, not only is this sense of human and cultural destruction heightened, but it also avoids reusing the graphic images of concentration camps, to which many people have unfortunately become desensitized. In fact, the more subtle technique of using items close to most people’s everyday lives, such as a letter, a suitcase, a toy or a diary, are probably more effective in breaking down the “us and them” or “then and now” psychological defense barriers. http://www.vl-museen.de/aus-rez/reid01-1.htm.
Rick was particularly moved by the sympathetic and accessible treatment of early European contributions to Ashkenazi culture. The tiny Jewish communities in the Rhine cities of Speyer, Worms, and Mainz were at the center of Jewish scholarship in the period from about 900 to 1300. Rick and I have spent many hours in our Torah study class discussing Rashi. Rashi’s commentary is a running river of midrash into which one dips from time to time, and it’s a thrill to get a glimpse of the historical circumstances in which he lived and thought. As someone who lives in the world of ideas, and whose heroes are people whose ideas change the way we take in the world, Rick is particularly taken by the human circumstances of the people behind the ideas.
Unfortunately, we did not have as much time for the museum as we would have liked, nor did we have time to visit the Neue Synagogue, although we could see the façade in the distance. The Neue Synagogue is a neo-byzantine building with Moorish influences, with a 50-meter high gilded dome.This was Germany's largest synagogue in 1866, and the symbol of the Jewish community in Berlin. Situated in the Scheunenviertel district (Barn Quarter), it lies in the heart of the then large Jewish district. During the infamous Kristallnacht pogrom on November 9-10, 1938, the synagogue was desecrated by the Nazis, and it was destroyed in 1943 by allied bombing. The building was finally demolished in 1958 and it wasn't until after the fall of the Wall that the reconstruction started, and was completed in May 1995. Together with the reconstruction of the Neue Synagogue, the whole Scheunenviertel district has enjoyed a revival. It is now a lively area, with many restaurants and cafés.
We got back to the hotel barely in time to get on the bus to go to the Einstein Forum in Pottsdam. The presentation, which took place in what was Einstein’s summer house in Caputh, was about “Einstein in Germany and the World.” It was given by Professor Susan Neiman, former (1982) Fulbrighter and now director of the Einstein Forum. This year marks the 100th anniversary of Einstein’s famous theory of relativity. Dr. Neiman talked mostly about Einstein’s political work, most of which took place after he left Germany. Her point, broadly stated, was that the popular conception of Einstein as a bumbling but lovable scientist is inaccurate. Most of the work of his later life, of which he left a voluminous record, was devoted to three causes: opposition of racism in all forms, support for the state of Israel, and socialism. Dr. Neiman’s informed opinion is that history has born out Einstein’s positions in the main. She also believes that Einstein was keenly aware of his reputation, and that he coolly used it to maximum advantage in his political work., (Einstein was the intellectual rock star of his day, and received a ridiculous amount of public attention.)
Some refer to 1905 as the miracle year, for it was then that five of Einstein’s greatest papers appeared. These would change the way human beings viewed the physical world, and would establish him as the world’s leading physicist—“the chief engineer of the universe.” His best-known papers are the two that founded special relativity. The first showed that absolute time had to be replaced by the speed of light; and the second, in which he asserted the equivalence of mass and energy, would lead to the famous formula E = mc2.
But we all know that. In 1920 Einstein's lectures in Berlin were disrupted by demonstrations which, although officially denied, were almost certainly anti-Jewish. In 1921 Einstein made his first visit to the United States. His main reason was to raise funds for the planned Hebrew University of Jerusalem. However, he received the Barnard Medal during his visit and lectured several times on relativity. He is reported to have commented to the chairman at the lecture he gave in a large hall at Princeton which was overflowing with people: “I never realized that so many Americans were interested in tensor analysis.” How fortunate that Einstein left Germany for Princeton in 1932, just three weeks before the Nazis came to power. Einstein became a US citizen in 1940 and died on April 16, 1955. http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/Einstein.html
The chartered bus took us from the Einstein Forum directly to the Berliner Ensemble, formerly the Bertolt Brecht theater, for the Conference’s formal Opening Ceremony. Anne Chermak, Minister-Counselor for Public Affairs at the US Embassy in Berlin, who is also the chairperson of the German-American Fulbright Commission, gave a short introduction, as did Dr. Rolf Hoffman, the Executive Director of the Fulbright Commission in Berlin, and Rolf-Dieter Schnelle, vice chairman of the Fulbright Commission and Deputy Director of Culture and Education in the German Federal Foreign Office.
The keynote address was given by Dr. Antonella Mei-Pochtler, a senior VP for the Boston Consulting Group in Vienna. Most of us thought her presentation about “Marketing Germany” was uninteresting and even inappropriate, but she was obviously chosen because BCG is a sponsor of the Fulbright program. Ms. Mei-Pochtler is an Italian-born economist who has worked in Germany and Austria. She is considered to be a marketing expert, specializing in product branding and involved in the reform of the German education system. She gave labor and attitude-survey statistics, mostly about Berlin, and talked about German negativism, low self-esteem and the current barriers to entrepreneurship. Her point seemed to be that negative media messages add to the German pessimism that is stifling growth and innovation. Her solution to “what’s wrong with Germany” includes a branding campaign with the theme of “Serious and Sexy,” capitalizing on the German values of quality, punctuality, and discipline.
The rest of the program consisted of splendid piano, violin, saxophone and percussion, and vocal performances by current Fulbright students and scholars. After the performances, we were treated to a reception with wine, beer and hors d’œuvres, mostly sandwiches. We were too engaged in conversations to gather at 8pm for the tour of Turkish Berlin. We also were not eager for a 2-hour walking tour on this dark and very cold evening. Instead we waited in vain for a bus to take us back to the hotel. Finally, we followed a large group to the tram station and retired to the hotel bar to continue our conversations.

posted by JWinn @ 10:00 PM