Jewish Heritage Europe

Calendar

Jul
16
Tue
Archaeology of the Holocaust @ Jewish community Vilnius
Jul 16 @ 17:30 – 18:30
Archaeology of the Holocaust @ Jewish community Vilnius | Vilnius | Vilniaus apskritis | Lithuania

Vilnius presentation of the new book by Dr. Richard Freund, the Maurice Greenberg Professor of Jewish History at the University of Hartford in Connecticut: The Archaeology of the Holocaust: Vilna, Rhodes, and Escape Tunnels.

Click to read more about the book

 

Jul
31
Wed
Dedication of restored tomb of Alfred Hajos @ Budapest Kozma utca Jewish cemetery
Jul 31 @ 11:00 – 12:30
Dedication of restored tomb of Alfred Hajos @ Budapest Kozma utca Jewish cemetery | Budapest | Hungary

Dedication ceremony of the restored tomb of Hungarian Jewish Olympics hero Alfred Hajos, an architect who also designed the monumental Holocaust memorial in the Kozma utca Jewish cemetery.

Click to see details of the ceremony

Read our article about it

Sep
19
Thu
Romaniote Memories – a Jewish Journey from Ioannina, Greece to Manhattan @ Greek Consulate in New York
Sep 19 @ 18:00 – Oct 3 @ 19:00
Romaniote Memories - a Jewish Journey from Ioannina, Greece to Manhattan @ Greek Consulate in New York | New York | New York | United States

Exhibition of Photographs by Vincent Giordano.

The photographs are part of a multi-media archive, created by Giordano, who died in 2010, that was sponsored by International Survey of Jewish Monuments and in 2019 will find a new home at the Hellenic American Project and Special Collections at the Library of Queens College, New York.

Giordano’s photographs document two related communities of Greek Romaniote Jews – in Ioannina, in northwestern Greece and on Broome Street on New York’s Lower East Side. Romaniote Jews trace their religious and cultural heritage to the Judaism of the ancient Greco-Roman world two-thousand years ago, and these two tiny congregations are among the few remaining to follow these traditions. Romaniotes have their own liturgy and cultural traditions, as well as their own language, a dialect of Greek that combines words and phrases from Hebrew and Turkish. This luminous black and white photo essay includes a poignant exploration of liturgy and ritual, conveying how people engage with religious space and carry on their time-honored sacred traditions.

The exhibition will open on Thursday, September 19th , 2019 at 6:00 p.m. it will continue through October 3rd, 2019. 

A panel discussion by experts will take place at the Consulate on Wednesday, September 25th, 2019 at 6:00 p.m.

 

Dec
10
Tue
Synagogues as Museums and Galleries in East‐Central Europe @ Grande Synagogue of Europe, Brussels
Dec 10 @ 18:00 – 21:00
Synagogues as Museums and Galleries in East‐Central Europe @ Grande Synagogue of Europe, Brussels | Bruxelles | Bruxelles | Belgium

The opening of a photo exhibition by Rudolf Klein that presents a brief survey of synagogues converted into museums and galleries in Hungary, Austria, Bosnia‐Herzegovina, Czech Republic, Poland, Romania, Serbia and Slovakia. The exhibit runs until January 16, 2020.

The opening includes talks (in English) by Klein, Polish researcher Natalia Romik,  and Professor Thomas Gergely.

Prior registration is required.  Click here

The event is organized in collaboration with the Great Synagogue of Europe, the Balassi Institute, the Polish Institute and the Austrian Cultural Forum.

Jan
23
Thu
Jewish Musicians and Jewish Music-Making in Polish Lands @ Polish Embassy London
Jan 23 @ 09:30 – 17:30
Jewish Musicians and Jewish Music-Making in Polish Lands @ Polish Embassy London | England | United Kingdom

A one-day Conference to Launch POLIN: Studies in Polish-Jewry

Vol. 32: ‘Jewish Musicians and Jewish Music-Making in Polish Lands’

Organized by the Institute for Polish-Jewish Studies, and the Institute of Jewish Studies, UCL.

Co-organized and supported by the Embassy of the Republic of Poland, and the Polish Cultural Institute, London, with the support of Ślipaczek Chartered Financial Planners

The astounding variety of music of all genres and styles produced by musicians of Jewish heritage in Europe since 1750 has been examined almost entirely in the context of German-speaking Europe or in studies of a group of composers who strongly self-identified as Jews.

In five thematic sections, this multi-disciplinary volume presents rich coverage of the main genres produced by musicians of Jewish origin in the Polish lands: Cantorial and Religious Music, Jews in Polish Popular Culture, Jews in the Polish classical music scene, The Holocaust reflected in Jewish music, and Klezmer in Poland today. This volume explores the activities and great creativity of musicians of the ‘Mosaic persuasion’, covering the area of the Polish-Lithunanian Commonwealth and its successor states from 1750 to the present. 

The conference will look at Cantorial Music, Jews and Polish popular culture, and Klezmer in Poland today. And there will be music!

‘POLIN Vol. 32’ is published by the Littman Library of Jewish Civilisation/Liverpool University Press.

Volume Editors: François Guesnet, Benjamin Matis, and Antony Polonsky.

 

Sep
7
Mon
House of Life opens @ Willesden Jewish Cemetery, London
Sep 7 all-day
House of Life opens @ Willesden Jewish Cemetery, London | England | United Kingdom

Willesden Jewish Cemetery reopens as multifaceted place of public heritage — the House of Life: an example of how Jewish cemeteries can be integrated into tourism while respecting the sanctity of the place

If offers guided tours, lectures, an exhibit in a new visitors’ center, and other public programming.

It respects its sanctity as a burial site but enables visitors to explore Jewish history and heritage, as well as learn about the lives of the many Jewish personalities buried there and engage with issues related to death, funeral traditions, and funerary art.

See cemetery web site for more details — http://www.willesdenjewishcemetery.org.uk

Click to read our article about it

 

Feb
11
Thu
Virtual Opening of Romaniote Memories: Photos of Vincent Giordano @ Online Zoom event
Feb 11 @ 17:00 – 18:00
Virtual Opening of Romaniote Memories: Photos of Vincent Giordano @ Online Zoom event
The exhibition can be seen at this link: https://scalar.usc.edu/works/romaniote-memories/index
 
In 1999, photographer Vincent Giordano made an unplanned visit to the small Kehila Kedosha Janina (KKJ) synagogue on New York’s Lower East Side. He knew little about Judaism or synagogues, and even less about the Romaniote Jewish tradition of which KKJ, built in 1927, is the lone North American representative. In this he was not alone. Romaniotes are among the least known of Jewish communities. Beginning in 2001 and guided by members of the KKJ community, Giordano documented the synagogue and its religious art of the congregation using film, video, and audio.
 
In 2019 the Giordano family donated the archive of Vincent’s work to Queens College, where it is a major part of the Hellenic American Project and is preserved as part of the Benjamin S. Rosenthal Library’s Special Collections and Archives.
 
The exhibition is sponsored by the Benjamin S. Rosenthal Library, Hellenic American Project, and Center for Jewish Studies at Queens College, in partnership with the International Center for Jewish Monuments, an independent non-profit organization.
 
The exhibition includes more than one hundred photographs, presented in ten thematic sections, accessible here.
 
To register for the exhibition’s opening reception on Zoom, featuring a conversation with curators, distinguished guests, and friends go to:
Aug
25
Wed
Architecture of Devotion – The Plans of Lipót Baumhorn for the Szeged New Synagogue @ Pava utca synagogue
Aug 25 2021 @ 16:30 – Jan 20 2022 @ 16:30

An exhibition presenting the construction history of the Szeged New Synagogue. The opening event is at 16:30 on August 25 (see the picture for the program).

The Hungarian Museum of Architecture and Monument Protection Documentation Center (MÉM MDK), in cooperation with the Jewish Community of Szeged and the Holocaust Memorial  Center, is commemorating Lipót Baumhorn and the 120 year-old synagogue in Szeged with an exhibition.

Baumhorn letter with drawing of Szeged synagogue. Photo: Szeged Jewish community/Rediscover

The exhibition on the ground floor of the Páva Street Synagogue, which is part of the Holocaust Memorial Center, focuses on the New Synagogue in Szeged, built between 1900 and 1903. In addition to the construction plans and the documents on the building created at the time of its construction, the sacred textiles made for the inauguration of the synagogue, including the Torah Ark curtain (parochet) and the Torah mantel will also be on display. The Jewish Community of Szeged has had the richly embroidered silk objects restored for this occasion.

Besides these objects, rich photographic material also illustrates the oeuvre of Lipót Baumhorn, who was born 160 years ago. The exhibits will not only present the twenty-six synagogues he designed, but visitors will also be able to see examples of his secular architectural work, as interpreted by the photographer Krisztina Bélavári. The synagogue that houses the exhibition was also designed by Lipót Baumhorn, so he is being commemorated in a worthy setting.

New Synagogue, Szeged

Curator: Ágnes Ivett Oszkó, Ph.D., art historian of the Hungarian Museum of Architecture and Monument Protection Documentation Center

Director of the restoration project for the Jewish Community of Szeged: Dóra Pataricza, Ph.D., historian

Professional consultants: Vera Ábrahám, head of the Archives of the Szeged Jewish Community; Dr. Rudolf Klein, Head of Department, University of Óbuda Ybl Miklós Faculty of Architecture; Pál Ritoók, art historian, head of the Museum Department of the Hungarian Museum of Architecture and Monument Protection Documentation Center

Jun
8
Thu
200th anniversary Kővágóörs synagogue @ Erzsébetváros Jewish History Museum Csanyi 5
Jun 8 @ 18:00 – 19:30
200th anniversary Kővágóörs synagogue @ Erzsébetváros Jewish History Museum Csanyi 5 | Budapest | Hungary

Opening of an exhibition of photographs by Daniella Grinberg to mark the 200th anniversary of the synagogue in the village of Kővágóörs, near the north shore of Hungary’s Lake Balaton.  The exhibit runs until June 30.

Long abandoned and ruined, the synagogue is now under the care of a foundation that purchased the building and is working  to restore it for use as both a synagogue and a cultural center. It already hosts cultural events there.

The Synagogue of Káli-valley Foundation (in Hungarian, Káli-medence Zsinagógája Alapítvány) officially acquired the building in October, 2020 after a year and a half of discussions, from a Canadian businessman of Hungarian origin, who had owned the synagogue since 2013.

 

Jul
23
Sun
Kos synagogue reopens @ Kal Shalom synagogue
Jul 23 @ 11:30 – 12:30
Kos synagogue reopens @ Kal Shalom synagogue | Greece

Inauguration of the restored synagogue on the island of Kos.

A new Ark and Bimah and other interior furnishings have been installed and — after decades out of its original use — the building will be rededicated as an active house of Jewish worship.

The Kos synagogue was built in the mid-1930s to replace an older synagogue that was destroyed in an earthquake in April 1933. It was abandoned after the near-total destruction of the circa 120 member Jewish community during the Holocaust, and then was purchased by the Municipality around 1984 and used as a local cultural centre.

See our post

 

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