TEMPORARY EXHIBITIONS

Between 3 December - 4 January, the touring exhibition The Second Life of Czech Torah Scrolls was on display at the Bohemian National Hall in New York. The exhibition covers the fate of about 1,500 scrolls from Bohemia and Moravia during and after the Shoah. The scrolls belonged to Jewish communities in Bohemia and Moravia before the Nazi occupation. They were saved during the war by being incorporated into the collections of the Jewish Museum in Prague. The scrolls were shipped to London in 1964, since when they have been overseen by the Memorial Scrolls Trust, which has made many of them available on loan to Jewish congregations across the world (in North and South America, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand). The exhibition was initiated and supported by the Society for the History of Czechoslovak Jews, the Bohemian Benevolent Literary Association, and the Consulate General of the Czech Republic in New York. 

Don’t Lose Faith in Mankind... The Protectorate Through the Eyes of Jewish Children

On Friday 25 January 2019, the Jewish Museum’s touring exhibition Don’t Lose Faith in Mankind... The Protectorate Through the Eyes of Jewish Children opened at the Jews in Latvia Museum in conjunction with commemorative events for International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The preview began with opening speeches by the Ambassador of the Czech Republic Miroslav Kosek and the Director of the Jews in Latvia Museum Ilja Lenský. The head of the Jewish Museum’s Department for Education and Culture, Zuzana Pavlovská, then gave a speech that not only recalled the importance of the 27th of January as International Holocaust Remembrance Day, but also drew attention to the 8th of March, which is when we commemorate the liquidation of the Terezín Family Camp at the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp. The aim of the exhibition is to familiarize elementary and high school students with the difficult topic of the Holocaust, and to introduce them to the Jewish minority by presenting the material in an attractive way. The exhibition shows various aspects of the life of Jews in the Nazi Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia from the perspective of the young people of the day.

I Have Not Seen A Butterfly Around Here: Children’s Drawings from the Terezín Ghetto on view in Kladno

On 6 March 2019, the touring exhibition I Have Not Seen A Butterfly Around Here: Children’s Drawings from the Terezín Ghetto opened at the Central Bohemian Research Library in Kladno. This exhibition draws attention to the world of children who became prisoners in the Terezín/Theresienstadt ghetto during the Second World War. Mass deportations of Jews to the newly established Terezín ghetto commenced in November 1941.
Originally a military fortress, Terezín was converted into a transit concentration camp at the end of 1941. Above all, Jews from the Nazi Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia were to be gathered there before being sent to extermination camps. Terezín became a transfer station en route to the death camps for tens of thousands of people, including about 11,000 children and young people. The Jewish self-government in the ghetto sought to create bearable conditions for the child inmates. One of the most important issues remained the need for lessons to be held, so as to preserve and further develop the ethical, aesthetic and intellectual values of the children. The lessons included art classes that were led by Friedl Dicker-Brandeis (1898-1944). The Terezín children’s drawings were made over a period of less than two years (1942-1944). The collection is absolutely unique and, comprising 4,500 original items, is the most extensive of its kind in the world.
The exhibition is on view at the Malá galerie / Minor Gallery of the Central Bohemian Research Library in Kladno until 23 April 2019 (address: Gen. Klapálka 1641, open during standard visiting hours).

New photo exhibition will be on display at the Museum's Department for Education and Culture 2 May - 28 June, 2019.

Maiselova 15, Prague 1, 3rd floor
Opening times: MO-THU 12-16, FRI 10-12 or as otherwise pre-arranged

 

On  28 January 2019, the Jewish Museum in Prague – in association with the Jewish Community of Prague and the Foundation for Holocaust Victims (NFOH) – hosted the annual gala concert at the Spanish Synagogue in Prague to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The opening speeches were given by Michal Borges (Secretary of the Prague Jewish Community, representing the chairman Jan Munk) and Leo Pavlát, the director of the Jewish Museum in Prague. The concert featured works by Antonín Rejcha, Maurice Ravel and Pavel Haas performed by the Belfiato Quintet.

 

From 25 January to 22 February 2019, the Jewish Museum’s Department for Education and Culture in Prague hosted the second annual event titled I Know What Happened – an extraordinary project devoted to the memory of the victims of the Second World War in connection with the International Holocaust Remembrance Day. This year, the department collaborated with the Prague Gymnázium Přírodní škola (Nature School) whose students led the workshop themselves under the supervision of instructors from the department. The programme was attended by nine schools, so the participating pupils and students had the opportunity to interact not only with the instructors, but also with their peers. They also learned what life was like in the Nazi Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia and, on the basis of their own research of Terezín children’s magazines and children’s drawings, they became acquainted with the specific fate of the child inmates of the Terezín/Theresienstadt ghetto during the Second World War. The programme ended with a visit to the Pinkas Synagogue Memorial for the Victims of the Shoah from the Czech Lands, where the participants searched for the names of specific children whose stories they had focused on during the project. Following on from last year’s success with the preview and exhibition of student projects inspired by this project, the department will once again display the artworks made by the participants of the “One Day in Terezín” workshop. The artworks will be presented in September 2019 during a discussion with a Shoah survivor and the opening show with music performed by students from the Nature School.

On 24 January 2019, for International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the Jewish Museum in Prague included in its Maisel Synagogue programme a performance of the theatre play … a bolelo nebe (… and Heaven Hurt) by the Disman Children’s Radio Ensemble. Based on authentic texts written by child inmates of the Terezín ghetto, the show was inspired by books by Dagmar Hilarová (Nemám žádné jméno / I Have No Name), Marie Rút Křížková, Kurt Jiří Kotouč and Zdeněk Ornest (Je mojí vlastí hradba ghett? / Is My Homeland a Ghetto Wall?), Chava Pressburger (Deník mého bratra / The Diary of My Brother) and Hanuš Hachenburg (poetry anthology Hned vedle bílá barva mráčků / Right Next to the White Colour of the Clouds). The theatre show (written and directed by Jana Franková) was followed by a short discussion with the Shoah survivor Toman Brod, together with the spontaneous participation of children from the Disman Children’s Radio Ensemble.

On Monday 25 March 2019, the Maisel Synagogue hosted a presentation of Vendulka. Útěk za svobodou (Vendulka: Escape to Freedom), a book that has recently been published by nakladatelství Paseka. The book describes the life story of Vendulka Vogelová, a girl who survived the Holocaust. Her story would probably never have made it into written form without the existence of photographs by the Czech photographer Jan Lukas, who photographed the Vogel family only a few hours before their deportation to the Terezín/Theresienstadt ghetto. Eighty years later, Vendulka Vogelová talked about her eventful life and friendship with the photographer Jan Lukas to the author of the book, Ondřej Kundr, who had searched for her in the USA on the basis of the photographs taken by Jan Lukas. Besides the author of the book, the gala evening was also attended by the daughters of Jan Lukas and by representatives of Vendulka Vogelová’s family.

On Thursday 28 March 2019, a discussion was held in the Maisel Synagogue about Zdeněk Toman, alias Zoltan Goldberger, a controversial figure in modern Czech history. The inspiration for the discussion was the autumn release of Ondřej Trojan’s film Toman, which describes a short period in the contradictory life of the foreign intelligence chief in post-war Czechoslovakia. Experts involved in the making of the film accepted an invitation to the discussion. In addition to Toman’s biographer Frank Reiss, upon whose story the film is based, the guests of the evening included the documentary filmmaker Martin Šmok and Toman František Hanzlík, a historian from the University of Defence in Brno and an expert advisor to the film. The entire evening was hosted by the journalist Petr Brod. The event met with great interest, and numerous questions were raised from the audience.

This March, the Jewish Museum in Prague and the Terezín Initiative honoured the memory of Bohemian and Moravian Jews from the Terezín/Theresienstadt Family Camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau who were murdered in March 1944. In total, 3,792 Jews from Bohemia and Moravia perished in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau on the night of 8-9 March 1944 – the largest single murder of Czechoslovak citizens during the Second World War. This tragic event was commemorated on the morning of 8 March 2019 in a memorial ceremony that was held by the Terezín Initiative at the Pinkas Synagogue Memorial for the Victims of the Shoah from the Czech lands.

On 7 March 2019, to commemorate the tragic events of 8 March 1944, the Prague Shoah Memorial and the Terezin Composers Institute, in co-operation with the Terezín Initiative and the Jewish Museum in Prague, organized a concert for the Terezín Family Camp at an event subtitled “Remembering BIIb” (BIIb was the section of Auschwitz II-Birkenau where the Terezín Family Camp was located). Czech soprano Irena Troupová performed with piano accompaniment by Jan Dušek. The Prague Gymnázium Přírodní škola (Nature School) recalled the tragic events with the songs of Terezín child inmates and motifs from the texts of Hanuš Haachenburg.

On Monday 11 March 2019, the Jewish Museum’s Department for Education and Culture organized the first seminar for teachers in the series Jews, History and Culture on the topics of antisemitism and the Shoah. This year, for the first time, the seminar was held during a single day. It was attended by 20 teachers from across the Czech Republic. Another seminar in this series will be held on 12 April, and 26 people have already applied to take part. In September 2018, the department also successfully held a follow-up to the series focusing on the anniversary of the founding of Czechoslovakia and Israel. This year’s sequel, which will be held August, is entitled The Jewish Story of the Velvet Revolution.

Title page of She'elot u-Teshuvot ha-Geonim (Prague, 1590) with the original call number
2.958 and Prague Jewish Religious Community stamp. Above the title is the hand-written
autograph of Rabbi David Zevi ben Aryeh Leib.
 

This is the second edition of short rabbinic responsa, referring back to the Constantinople edition of 1575. The title page is decorated with various human figures, angels, lions and the printer’s emblem in the middle – hands raised in the priestly blessing (signet of the printer Mordecai Gershon ha-Kohen). Above the title is the autograph signature of David Zevi ben Aryeh Leib – namely, Rabbi David Zevi Auerbach of Kremenets (Ukraine, ca. 1743-1808), whose father was a student of Baal Shem Tov.
 

Hebrew record of the book She'elot u-Teshuvot ha-Geonim, printed in Prague in 1590
with visible call number 2.958 in a bound catalogue kept by the Prague Jewish
Community librarian Tobias Jakobovits (1887–1944).
 

This copy was part of the pre-war library of the Prague Jewish Religious Community.  Dating back to 1857, the core of the library’s holdings comprised gifts and bequests from prominent Prague personalities, such as Chief Rabbi Solomon Judah Rapoport, the Prague book printer Moshe Israel Landau, and the Burial Society Secretary Koppelmann Lieben, among others. The book was returned to the Jewish Museum Library in March 2019.
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Purchase of three rare documents for the Jewish Museum in Prague

On 19 December 2018, the New York office of the world-renowned Sotheby’s Auction House held a sale of more than 200 Jewish antiques at an auction titled “Important Judaica, including a Distinguished Private Collection”. The auction catalogue included four items of Bohemian origin, specifically documents from the 16th-18th centuries that are of exceptional historical, cultural and diplomatic interest: a privilege granted to the Jewish Community of Mikulov/Nikolsburg by Maximilian von Dietrichstein in 1591, a privilege granted to Rabbi David Oppenheimer by Leopold von Dietrichstein in 1700, a certificate of 1739 attesting to a barber-surgeon’s qualifications, and a power of attorney granted to the leaders of the Prague Jewish Community in 1687. Moreover, the first three documents stem from the private collection of Dr. Richard Teltscher, a well-known merchant and philanthropist who became known, among other things, as the founder of the Jewish Central Museum for Moravia-Silesia in Mikulov.

The Jewish Museum in Prague decided to take part in the New York auction for the reason that Bohemian Judaica of such importance very rarely appear at auction, and the opportunity to add such interesting documents to its archival collections is unlikely to be repeated for many years. We were able to make successful bids for three of the four documents.

The first document purchased by the Jewish Museum at the auction is the Privilege Granted to the Jewish Community of Nikolsburg by Maximilian von Dietrichstein, Nikolsburg, 1 November 1591. This is the oldest extant privilege for this community, but it is also an important historical source for studying the local Jewish self-government. With regard to this historic document, it is also of interest that for many years the scholarly literature thought it to be lost.

Privilege Granted to the Jewish Community of Nikolsburg by Maximilian von Dietrichstein,
Nikolsburg, 1 November 1591

 

The second document is the Vollmacht (Power of Attorney) to Negotiate on Behalf of the Estate of Mordechai Meisel, Prague, 2 January 1687. This manuscript is uniquely valuable, particularly because it is signed, in German and Hebrew, by twenty-one elders and officers of the Prague Jewish community leaders. Moreover, it is a remarkable historical record of the long, drawn-out trials concerning the estate of Mordechai Meisel, the former leader of the Prague Jewish community and Court Jew to Emperor Rudolf II.

The third document is the Certificate Granted by Herschl Porges to Simon ben Moÿßes Löbl of Holleschau Attesting to His Skill as a Barber-Surgeon, Prague, 26 May 1739. This parchment has a beautiful seal attached and is an interesting proof of the requirements for Jewish barber-surgeons to practice their trade in Prague in the first half of the eighteenth century.

Certificate Granted by Herschl Porges to Simon ben Moÿßes Löbl of Holleschau, 1739

The acquisition of these three documents considerably enriches the Jewish Museum’s archival holdings, especially in view of the fact that Judaica of such importance are only sparsely represented in its collections. The documents are of incalculable historical and cultural value to the Czech Jewish community. Their acquisition will undoubtedly contribute to the prestige of the Jewish Museum in Prague among the professional and lay public. After careful inspection by conservators, the documents will be professionally catalogued and permanently placed in the depository of the Jewish Museum’s Archives. We also expect that they will be placed on display in temporary exhibitions, or that facsimiles will be made of them for the Jewish Museum’s permanent exhibitions.

TripAdvisor rating

In 2018, the Jewish Museum in Prague won a TripAdvisor Travelers’ Choice Award, which is awarded to institutions with the highest rating in the Museum category. The award was given not only for the Museum’s profile as a whole, but also for the Spanish Synagogue. The Travelers’ Choice award is the highest award given by TripAdvisor. Based on the reviews and opinions of millions of travellers, the Museum is among the top one percent of tourist destinations. Last year, the Museum managed to win a total of five TripAdvisor Certificate of Excellence awards for its long-term reviews. Namely, this concerns the profile of the Museum as a whole, as well as the Spanish Synagogue, the Pinkas Synagogue, the Klausen Synagogue, and the Old Jewish Cemetery. The Certificate of Excellence highlights the uniqueness of the Museum’s historic monuments and tourist destinations. It is only given to organizations that have received excellent reviews from travellers across the world on TripAdvisor. The Jewish Museum in Prague devotes systematic attention to the reviews and comments from its visitors. In total, more than 10,000 visitor reviews have been received and answered by the Museum through the TripAdvisor Review portal.