I was told that today would be a good day to write a blog because there’s substance to Yad Vashem and there’s a lot to say. But I was nervous because of how important of a topic it is and expectations are high. I wanted to be able to capture a meaningful and useful blog that represents the architecture of the buildings of Yad Vashem.
Designed by Moshe Safdie, every detail of the building’s structure is deliberate. But the interesting thing is, Safdie doesn’t explain the reasons for the details, leaving it up to the viewer’s interpretation. This allows each person to have their own religious experience and to reflect on a personal level.
The first memorial honors the righteous among the nation (previously called righteous gentiles). A garden of trees planted with plaques including the names of the incredibly brave non-Jewish people who risked their lives to aid in the hiding and rescuing of Jews. This garden includes 28,000 names and is continuing to grow in number as they receive more names.
The main building’s interior begins with the triangle video titled ‘A Living Landscape’ to represent that the Jews killed were still people before the dehumanization of the Holocaust. The shoe exhibit was a glass bottom of the floor to represent graves of the people whose shoes were taken from them at the camps. Unlike the museum in Washington, D.C., Yad Vashem designers chose to not include a cattle car because they felt that it misrepresented the climb into the car and crowdedness of it.
At the end of the museum there is a room whose walls are filled with books of names – of 5 million of them and counting – serving as a memorial to those who were lost. Names that are still being collected to this day. In the center of the room you can look down to see a reflecting pool. I interpreted this as a point to see your own reflection, symbolizing the generations that are able to be here because of the holocaust survivors.
You are bombarded by life when you leave the museum, the exit opening onto an incredible view of the city of Jerusalem. This as well as all other parts of the museum is deliberate.
The importance of the museum is not only to commemorate the number of lives lost, but to try and get the viewer thinking of each individual life/Jew that suffered in the Holocaust. This will finally give them the respect they deserve – respect of being treated like humans.