Theatre as a Medium of Recollection—Klaus Michael Grüber's and Antonio Recalcati's Rudi Installation (1979)

Abstract

In the middle of the cranescape around Potsdamer Platz, one of the most questionable building projects of the reunified Berlin can currently be viewed. If one walks in an easterly direction along Potsdamerstrasse, on the left, just behind the Kammermusiksaal and the Philharmonie, one sees the scaffolding of Helmut Jahn's eleven-storey Sony Centre, which, in its triangular form, extends to the Potsdamer Platz. As can be gathered from the models and computer simulations found in the scarlet infobox on the adjoining Leipziger Platz, the Chicago architect is planning to construct a complex consisting of a forum, the Sony Europa Centre, an office tower and two office blocks. In conjunction with the Centre and the tower as the tallest element, these two office blocks—one pointing east toward Bellevuestrasse and the other pointing west toward the Philharmonie—form a triangle that circumscribes an oval forum. The office blocks, as well as the Centre and the tower, are steel and glass constructions whose rooms at the back will offer a view of the forum from floor to ceiling. The approximately 100-metre high office tower will assume dynamism and elegance by virtue of a glass façade that will extend sideways above and beyond the semicircular building.