FLOOR PLAN

FLOOR PLAN
is a life-sized architectural blueprint drawing of a formerly existing Berlin synagogue, reproduced (to scale) on a grassy strip between Brucknerhaus and the Danube River in Linz. Fluorescent tubing installed in the earth articulates the floor plan of the destroyed building transforming it into a ghostly drawing of light.
Rising three-dimensionally from the "drawing" is a partially constructed interior wall built of charred books arranged in stacks of varying heights. Above those book columns is a horizontal line of fire representing the top of the wall. This WALL OF FIRE provides a vertical element and focus to Floor Plan. It also serves as a visual metaphor:
• the "eternal light" used traditionally in all synagogues throughout the world
• the fires of Kristallnacht that burned throughout Germany and Austria on 9 and 10 November 1938
• the fires that consumed much of European Jewry between Kristallnacht and June 1945
• fire = life
In addition to the presence of the fluorescent lights and WALL OF FIRE, other details include scattered wooden pews and fragments of plaster statuary appearing throughout the space. 100 square tiles (see "A Note on the Subtitle: FROM ADLER TO ZYLBER") with images and corresponding Jewish surnames-whose meanings in the German language evoke images of nature (Blumenthal, Coldberg, Himelblau, Mond, Vogel, etc.) - are another important element for Floor Plan.

Sonically, the music of Floor Plan Notes From The Underground (Die unterirdischen Noten) reflects the apocalyptical facts implicit in Floor Plan as well as the real threat of destruction of all biological life on this planet. A sonic plasma of a continuously shifting polyphony combines the musics of hundreds of thousands of unaccompanied human voices singing in Hebrew, Yiddish and other languages; the cries and speech of the Animal Kingdom, especially those threatened with extinction - elephants, whales, wolves, etc.; the sounds of ancient instruments of ritual - the drum, the ram's horn, the conch shell and jaw's harp; foreboding industrial, electronic sounds as well as the sounds of natural disaster. This is all heard emanating from some 75 loudspeakers buried in the earth alongside the light drawing.

A historical note
Floor Plan uses an actual architectural floor plan as the basis of its design. The Synagogue of the Reform Congregation, Johannisstraße 16, Berlin-Mitte is the model. Designed by Custav Stier (1807-1880) in 1853, built in 1853-4 and unveiled in 1854, the Synagogue was damaged on Kristallnacht, 9 / 10 November, 1938 and destroyed during the Second World War.

---