The Museum of Jewish Heritage, located in Battery Park City in Manhattan, New York City, is a living memorial to those murdered in the Holocaust. The museum has received more than 2 million visitors since opening in 1997. The mission statement of the museum is “to educate people of all ages and backgrounds about the broad tapestry of Jewish life in the 20th and 21st centuries — before, during, and after the Holocaust.” The museum’s building includes two wings: a six-sided building with a pyramid-shaped roof designed to evoke the memory of the six million Jews killed in the Holocaust, and the Robert M. Morgenthau Wing. The six-sided building, opened in 1997, contains the museum’s core exhibition galleries. The Morgenthau Wing, opened in 2003, contains the museum’s offices, theater, and classrooms, as well as the Irving Schneider and Family exhibition gallery. Both wings were designed by designed by Roche-Dinkeloo. The museum’s collection contains more than 30,000 objects relating to Jewish history and the Holocaust. These objects are used in a variety of exhibitions and installations.
Auschwitz. Not long ago. Not far away
This special exhibition opened in May 2019 and ran until August 30, 2020.
Ordinary Treasures: Highlights From The Museum Of Jewish Heritage Collection
This exhibition features drawings and everyday items, many of which were donated by the relatives of the original owners. The exhibition shows some aspects of daily life for European Jews under Nazi rule.
Andy Goldsworthy’s Garden of Stones Andy Goldsworthy‘s living memorial garden, his first permanent commission in New York City, opened to the public on September 17, 2003. An eloquent garden plan of trees growing from stone, the garden was planted by the artist, Holocaust survivors, and their families. This contemplative space, meant to be revisited and experienced differently over time as the garden matures, is visible from almost every floor of the museum.
Gerda III Gerda III was a Danish rescue boat used in 1943 to save Jewish refugees by transporting then from Denmark to Sweden. The boat was donated to the museum by the Danish Parliament in 1997 and is on long-term loan to Mystic Seaport. The vessel’s history is captured in the book Henny and Her Boat: Righteousness and Resistance in Nazi-Occupied Denmark.
Edmond J. Safra Hall
In the 375-seat Edmond J. Safra Hall, the museum offers a schedule of films, concerts, and panel discussions throughout the year. Past programs have included symposia on the Holocaust, interfaith dialogues, and concerts featuring established and emerging artists. Over the last few years, the museum has held a day-long symposium on Darfur with policy makers and leaders on human rights; presented performers such as Idan Raichel and David Strathairn; hosted film screenings with actors and directors such as Kirk Douglas, John Turturro, Quentin Tarantino, Claude Lanzmann, and Ed Zwick; explored Justice after the Holocaust with experts like Alan Dershowitz; and hosted the revival of a Yiddish operetta, Die Goldene Kale.
Rendering Witness: Holocaust-Era Art as Testimony
This exhibition “features art made during and immediately after the Holocaust by those who lived it,” including art made by prisoners in concentration camps and American liberators. The exhibit is intended to showcase the Holocaust as people saw it during the time.
JewishGen JewishGen is the leading internet site for Jewish genealogy and provides free online access to a vast collection of Jewish ancestral records. JewishGen and the museum affiliated in 2003. JewishGen features over 22 million records (including family trees containing 7 million individuals, 3 million burial records, and 2.75 million Holocaust records), hundreds of translated Yizkor Books, research tools, a family finder, educational classes, and many other constantly updated resources.
Auschwitz Jewish Center
In addition to the New York campus, the museum has also operated the Auschwitz Jewish Center in Oświęcim, Poland, since 2006. Before the invasion of Poland and later occupation of Poland by Nazi Germany Oświęcim (renamed Auschwitz by the Nazis) was just an ordinary Polish town. The majority of its citizens were Jewish. Following the end of the World War II Auschwitz became the ultimate symbol of the Holocaust. In September 2000, the Auschwitz Jewish Center opened its doors to honor the former residents of the town and to teach future generations about what was lost. Located less than 2 miles (3.2 km) from Auschwitz-Birkenau, it is the only remaining Jewish presence in the town. The AJC’s mission is also to provide all visitors with an opportunity to memorialize victims of the Holocaust through the study of the life and culture of a formerly Jewish town and to offer educational programs that allow new generations to explore the meaning and contemporary implications of the Holocaust. The Center provides regularly scheduled exhibitions and educational programs. The United States Service Academy Program takes cadets and midshipmen to Poland for a three-week trip to learn from survivors, scholars, and historians. The Auschwitz Jewish Center Fellows program is a three-and-a-half-week study trip for students who are matriculated in graduate programs or are completing undergraduate degrees.
National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene
The National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene is a professional theater company in New York City, founded in 1915, which produces both Yiddish plays and plays translated into Yiddish, in a theater equipped with simultaneous superscript translation into English. The theater company has been in residence at the Museum of Jewish Heritage since 2016.
