KAO - Kao Lak - Gedenkstätte

Der Entwurf basiert auf der sektionalen Übersetzung von Gefühlseindrücken, die entsprechend des zeitlichen Ablaufes der Tsunamikatastrophe in Kao Lak entlang einer gedachten Achse bis zum Meer programmiert wurden. Es entsteht eine begehbares Denkmal, welches durch räumliche Eindrücke den Besucher in zeitlich aufeinander abgestimmte Gefühlszustände versetzt.

The Memorial of Emotions- an emotional and physical scar in nature - gives the visitor the opportunity to find his own, personal scar, his own way and place of remembrance. Discovering the memorial physically, means discovering his own mind emotionally. The Memorial of Emotions offers a variety of spaces, stimulating the visitor's perception, and emotional reaction through the following parameters:

wideness, tilting angle of the floor, height of bordering walls, shifting angle of the bordering walls. As the shape of the spaces aims to stimulate emotionally, the memorial bears as well information about the catastrophe and its consequences through the exhibition space and the "chronology of the disaster" on the way down to the sea. It joins physical and emotional aspects in one architectural solution. Unifying information with emotion and remembrance with hope.

Similar to a knife, the memorial building cuts into the landscape from the road to the sea and leaving visible scarfs of destruction. The path culminates in an open view to the ocean and a platform tilted to and flooded by the ocean everyday with high tide, carrying away personal items of remembrance. The platform with a nearly eternal number of impressions in form of a lotus flower symbolises the enormous loss of life and creating a place of peace, remembrance and hope.