The new and the old buildings of the Jewish Museum. The architect of the new building, Daniel Libeskind, explains: "There are three basic ideas that formed the foundation for the design. First, the impossibility of understanding the history of Berlin without understanding the enormous intellectual, economic and cultural contribution made by the Jewish citizens of Berlin. Second, the necessity to integrate physically and spiritually the meaning of the Holocaust into the consciousness and memory of the city of Berlin. Third, that only through the acknowledgement and incorporation of this erasure and void of Jewish life in Berlin, can the history of Berlin and Europe have a human future."
Libeskind lost most of his family in the Holocaust. He was born east of Berlin in Lodz, Poland.
