Daniel Libeskind's Holocaust Museum (Mar 1992)

Ron Brown has reconstructed leading international architect Daniel Libeskind‘s compelling illustrated talk to the 1992 RAIA Challenge of Excellence world conference on the Jewish Holocaust Museum project that he designed in Berlin. Libeskind discusses the philosophy and design ideas behind the award-winning project, and shows unique images of the design development stage of the project.

Though he had been an architectural theorist and professor for many years, Libeskind only completed his first building at the age of 52, with the opening of the Felix Nussbaum Haus in 1998. Prior to this, critics had dismissed his designs as “unbuildable or unduly assertive.” The first design competition that Libeskind won was in 1987 for housing in West Berlin, but soon thereafter the Berlin Wall fell and the project was cancelled. Libeskind won the first four projects he entered into competition for. The Jewish Museum Berlin, completed in 1999, was Libeskind’s first major international success and was one of the first buildings designed after reunification.

Today the museum is Germany’s most visited. Libeskind has also designed cultural and commercial institutions, museums, concert halls, convention centers, universities, residences, hotels, and shopping centers. Critics often describe Libeskind’s work as deconstructivist.

Producer & Camera – Ron Brown

Editor – Damian Jenkins