The Irish Times

An Irish architect's concept for a new kind of gallery, in honour of a children's writer, is helping a German city come to terms with its past. Teaching Germans how to remember their past is, at first glance, like teaching your grandmother to suck eggs. The past bloody century has made Germans experts, some would say hostages, of their history. Now an Irish architect, Ruairķ O'Brien, has won a prize for his unconventional way of helping a people remember their past. O'Brien (41) has enlivened a tired historical debate by creating a museum honouring one of Germany's most loved authors - and now he has ambitious plans for another museum, to address the vanishing architecture of the former East Germany.