Goldrich Center—a beacon of hope—opens in Pan Pacific Park June 14
After five years in the making, the bold, insightful $70 million Goldrich Cultural Center which includes Holocaust Museum LA, is poised to open Sun., June 14, in Pan Pacific Park at 100 Grove Dr.
Holocaust Museum LA, which opened in Pan Pacific Park in 2010, is still on site and is incorporated into the new campus as one of its three pavilions.
RENDERING of the new museum shows the boxcar pavilion lit at night and visible from Pan Pacific Park.
Upon arrival visitors will be greeted by a soaring canopy, from where each building within the complex enters and exits. It’s a symbol of transparency and inclusivity and a beacon of hope, the architect of the Goldrich Center, Hagy Belzberg, said.
The new design is twice the size—70,000 square feet—of its predecessor and a large leap from the museum’s humble beginnings in 1961 when it was founded by a small group of Holocaust survivors.
They had met at an English-as-a-second-language class and found temporary places to show their treasured mementos. A prison uniform from Dachau concentration camp was among them.
Survivors at the time were told to put the past behind them. But, “what they had experienced was so horrific, they knew they needed to start educating young people. That’s really how the museum started,” said Goldrich Center CEO Beth Kean.
Their legacy has come to fruition—and then some. Those few early artifacts are among 25,000 objects now at the museum, the tattered uniform among them.
True to its mission to educate young people, 150,000 students are among the 500,000 visitors expected to visit the site annually.
Funding for the new museum was kick started by the state with a $8.5 million grant. “That sent an important message of amplifying our reach and impact,” said Kean. Additional funds came from the building’s namesake, the late Jona Goldrich, a real estate developer and Holocaust survivor, as well as other donors.
Perhaps the most moving element at the museum is an authentic boxcar unearthed near a death camp in Poland. Young and old alike were squeezed inside this and countless other cattle cars on their gruesome journey to concentration camps and, for many, to their deaths.
While we have all seen images of the railroad cars in films, “seeing one of these in real life just gets you. It’s so haunting, seeing this and knowing the role it played hundreds of times,” said Belzberg.
“These weren’t elegant platforms that you just walked in,” Belzberg added as he showed a map etched on the floor of the extensive railroad tracks the cars traveled.
“It shows you the train system and how massive it really was. It goes across Europe,” said Kean, adding, the map helps illustrate how the “Jewish population was just wiped out.” (Millions of Soviet prisoners of war, Poles, Roma, gay men, and others perished under the Nazi regime in addition to 6 million Jews.)
The museum is designed to reflect life during war, when much of the world goes on as normal, while things can be quite different behind the scenes.
Large windows inside the pavilions look out to the grassy, light-filled park, where people walk dogs, play sports, and enjoy picnics.
The museum not only tells of the Holocaust but serves as a cultural center and a bridge, literally, as one of the pavilions, the Touring Pavilion, is built on a bridge.
“Hagy and brilliant engineers figured out how to build above a flood control channel, which is also a metaphor. We want to be a landmark for hope and understanding, and also for community building,” said Kean.
ARCHITECT Hagy Belzberg stands in front of an authentic boxcar from World War II last month while the site was under construction.
Inside are two classrooms and the 215-seat S. Mark Taper Theater with a state-of-the-art projector and a stage for live performances and lectures.
In a smaller theater, visitors will meet survivor Renee Firestone, 103, through voice recognition and holographic technology.
The 2010 museum was built underground to preserve the park; its landscaped roof has expanded in the new campus as the GRoW@Annenberg Rooftop Garden, designed by Mia Lehrer. A pathway below leads to a seating area made of wood collected from the Palisades and Eaton fires, which is among the many recycled measures throughout the property.
Glass walls lead visitors down a narrow, gradual slope, where, inside, galleries begin with a series of front pages of Los Angeles Times articles dating from 1933. They tell of the rise of racial discrimination and the Nazi Party growing in Germany from an Angeleno perspective.
The light gets dimmer as we pass more galleries with photos of Adolf Hitler, the Berlin Olympics, the Nuremberg Trials, and displays of banned books—including some by Los Angeles authors. There are members of the resistance, such as Raoul Wallenberg, the story of Anne Frank, and then we come to interactive screens of Auschwitz, one of the many death camps.
As we ascend, natural light returns in a new space that addresses steps that lead to genocide. Some places covered are Cambodia, Rwanda, Myanmar, Darfur, Native Americans, Yazidi, and Armenians.
“It’s not just a Holocaust story. It’s a human story,” Belzberg said. It’s also a personal story more than a project for the Santa Monica-based architect. His father and grandparents escaped Poland before the Nazis arrived. Family members who stayed perished.
Also featured at the new campus is Meet Your Neighbors, a permanent tribute to L.A.’s diversity, featuring photos and poems translated into 24 languages.
The museum is an emotionally moving and historical without overwhelming. It can be taken in small pieces, which was very much by design.
“We didn’t want one big building. We wanted a very fluid building,” Belzberg said.
CEO Kean said, “We envision people who live in this area will keep coming back. We’re going to have really interesting book talks, live theater, arts and culture programming, education, and information to open people’s minds.”
“Beautiful Game” on exhibit
In the spirit of the World Cup games, set to begin in Los Angeles this month, the Goldrich Center’s premiere exhibit, “The Beautiful Game: The Untold Story,” tells of the Jewish influence on the sport before, during, and after the war. (The American Youth Soccer Organization was started by a Jewish Holocaust survivor, notes Belzberg.)
Parking is at The Grove, across the street. The museum is free opening day and always free for students and youth under 17. Visit thegoldrich.org.
Category: Real Estate
