Well fans like every good story, this too must have an end. Our last two days in Berlin we mainly spent hitting the few things we missed throughout the month.
Our first stop Monday morning was to the German History Museum (above) by I.M. Pei. Pei is the architect of the Meyerson Symphony Hall in Dallas as well as a recipient of the Pritzker Prize. The addition to the old German History Museum worked quite nicely as acted as its own entity while still respecting and complimenting the old Museum. The collection inside was quite expansive covering thousands of years of German History. Needless to say, I had to do a sort of sort of drive by scan of the museum as we only had an hour.
After lunch and a church visit, we finished up our day at most repulsive building of the trip. The Wissenschaftszentrum (above) was a post modern "treasure" by architect James Sterling. From the color to the random historical motifs, everything just felt wrong. We spiraled up through the library, I felt as though I died more and more at each floor. Granted this building was partially visited as an architectural equivalent of the show "What Not to Wear," so I don't feel guilty ranting about my dislike for this project. I think all students on the trip in future should definitely go see this project so they can further appreciate the good architecture throughout.
After a good night sleep to recover from the horrors of the Post Modern nightmare, we spent our last day on Museum Island. In short, Museum Island is a giant German treasure chest of five museums displaying all the artifacts looted from other countries over the last few centuries. Here you can find artifacts from Egyptian, Roman, and Islamic history dating back thousands of years. Probably the crown jewel of Museum Island is the Pergamon Alter (below). Once of the Seven Wonders of the World, the alter now sits in a museum in the middle of Berlin. It was a really bizarre exhibit as the entire museum was built for the very purpose of housing the alter. Also in the museum was the Ishtar Gate. Once the major gate into Babylon, the gate now resides in a side room of a German museum.
After leaving the Pergamon Museum, I found it appropriate to take one last visit to one of "The Man's" buildings. The Altes Museum (below) is widely considered Schinkel masterpiece, as it stands at the front entrance to Museum Island. I, along with several other students, have a particularly strong interest in the building after spending all night drafting its plans and sections. Like all of Schinkel's work, most of the finishes are faux, but its still an impressive feat of architecture for its time.
We then ended our day touring the Reichstag, providing an appropriate end to our journey at the location where we began (cue snake eating tale analogy). Despite having a seemingly busy schedule at times, I found this trip to be a truly life changing experience. The amount of knowledge I gathered will continue to resonate for years to come. But a month away has began to take its toll and I'm ready to be home.
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