While a bunch of musty old books may not, at first, sound like a diverting idea for an exhibition, Columbia University has succeeded in bringing to life an illuminating collection of Judaic manuscripts. “The People in the Books: Judaic Manuscripts at Columbia University Libraries,” on display in the Rare Book and Manuscript Library until January…
Jewish philanthropist Michael Steinhardt will auction off his 500-piece Judaica collection, Sotheby’s announced. The auction house will offer a dedicated auction titled “A Treasured Legacy: The Michael & Judy Steinhardt Judaica Collection” on April 29 in New York. Steinhardt has been collecting rare and unusual Judaica for the past three decades, according to Artdaily.org. “It…
A kosher restaurant in Hollywood, Fla., was torched by two masked arsonists. The fire last Friday at the Achla Pita Grill took place at Emerald Center, the same strip mall where a Judaica store burned down last December. The arsonists are seen on surveillance footage entering the restaurant’s kitchen and splashing flammable liquid all over…
At 5 p.m. on the last Wednesday in March, Michael Bolla, a New York real estate developer, stood inside Israel Wholesale & Retail Judaica on the Lower East Side, glancing over tables cluttered with Hebrew prayerbooks and Bibles, spice boxes and candlesticks. The store had thrived on this block of Essex Street, between Hester and…
Crossposted from Samuel Gruber’s Jewish Art & Monuments For the past year I’ve been curator of the Plastics Collection at Syracuse University, and while I have not given up my research and activism vis-a-vis Jewish art and architecture, I have launched into to a new work area. Usually, I just split my interests — plastics…
Crossposted from Samuel Gruber’s Jewish Art & Monuments Bar-Ilan University professor Ilia Rodov has written an important and useful article on medieval Torah Arks, especially those tall tower types, well known from representations in many illuminated medieval manuscripts. The article, “Tower-like Torah Arks, the Tower of Strength and the Architecture of the Messianic Temple,” was…
Does the Coen Brothers’ “True Grit” draw on ancient Indo-European myth? Forward contributor Zackary Sholem Berger translates two poems, “My Pedigree” by Moyshe Nadir and “Herring Barrels” by Dvoyre Fogel, in the latest issue of Eleven Eleven. Israeli musician Avi Avital has become the first mandolinist to be nominated for a Grammy award in the…
Sotheby’s New York sale of important Judaica, an annual event featuring ceremonial metalwork, manuscripts and printed books, takes place this year on December 15. Leading the auction are a pair of Italian-made silver Torah finials belonging to Sha’ar HaShamayim, the Great Synagogue of Gibraltar. Other items such as 15th-century Torah scroll from Poland are also…
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