Stark And Solemn

Here we have a view looking out at the Holocaust Monument from where I left off yesterday. Have a look at the website for a bird's eye view of it.

This is a closer view of Burtynsky's photograph etched onto the wall. Track 17, Berlin, Germany captures a spot in the heart of the German capital that was a focal point for Holocaust operations. Trains leaving this freight yard would carry Jews to ghettos and death camps starting in 1941.

This is the most haunting of Burtynsky's photographs, even decades after the Holocaust. Fence, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Poland depicts the barbed wire electric fence of the death camp where well over a million people, many of them Jews, were systematically murdered during the Holocaust.

I have three close ups here with period photographs on the panels I showed yesterday. Other photographs I chose to not do in close ups, given the material.

There is a staircase (and an elevator for those who require it) leading to an overlook. Part of the design of the Monument includes a sharp point directed east towards Parliament Hill, where the Peace Tower can be glimpsed at a distance on the left. The Firefighters Memorial is directly across the street,  and a careful eye can pick out the large statue there.

Turning around from here shows more of the architecture.

Burtynsky's last two works are side by side. Hiding Place, Warsaw Jewish Cemetery, Poland depicts a trench beneath the tombstones that served as a refuge for Jewish families during raids.

Prayer Room, Theresienstadt, Czech Republic shows a place of prayer that was created despite the misery and torment of the camp ghetto.

Here we have one final view. I have found this place to be haunting, filled with sadness, but also something that should have been built here in Canada long ago. It is fitting that it has been completed. May we never forget.