The relationship between memory and History in Berlin is always really problematic and not simple to understand and this Park just in front of Hauptbahnhof is a very good example: a place which was almost intact has been demolish and then some years later they've made a new public park to create a conceptual memorial park for it.
The prison (a prussian one made by an english model) was built in 1842-1849, in which the prisoners were imprisoned in 520 individual cells. The prison was in nazi time "Symbol für politische Unterdrückung, Folter und Mord" (symbol of political oppression, torture and murder) after the Wehrmacht and the Gestapo created more cells wings. The prison resists to the WWII and was then used by the Allies to imprison some Nazis which had been sentenced to death. It was demolished in 1958.
The spatial impression of a cell has been modeled in a concrete sculpture and in the former central monitoring area, has been created a panopticon. In this prison were forced the men who stands agains the nazis and then killed some days before the fall of Berlin. One of these men was A. Haushofer, who wrote "the moabit sonnets". One of these sonnets (In Fesseln) has been partially painted on the che former prison walls.
To be honest the idea is really nice and is a good way of creating something with is not so strong to watch, but can give the idea of the past in a conceptual way. But the problem remains: what's the meaning to destroy our history today and then to try to recreate it 20 years later?
More infos: GSE (german)
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