Menashe Kadishman (Israeli, 1932-2015)

"Shalechet" (Fallen Leaves), Plasma ...

"Shalechet" (Fallen Leaves), Plasma cutting mild steel, 12 x 12 cm, Signed on verso.

The Memory Void, one of the symbolic spaces on the ground level of the Libeskind building at the Jewish Museum in Berlin, includes the installation Shalekhet (Fallen Leaves) by Menashe Kadishman.

More than 10,000 faces with open mouths, cut from heavy round iron plates, cover the floor of the ground floor void.

Menashe Kadishman’s sculptures stir painful memories of the victims of war.

In this striking installation, 10,000 face-shaped iron plates cover the entire floor. The faces have terrified expressions, some screaming, some emotionless.

Visitors are invited to walk on the faces and to step on them, making jarring clanking sounds of discomfort as they clang and rattle against one another.

The installation forces visitors to realize, much of the ground we step on currently used to be a site for violent history and painful deaths.

Israeli artist Menashe Kadishman dedicated his artwork not only to Jews killed during the Shoah, but to all victims of violence and war.