Fall 2016: Confluence: An annual publication of The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life

confluence FALL 2016

An annual publication of The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life

FROM THE FACULTY DIRECTOR:

Magnes on the Move Dear Friends, It has been such an honor to serve as Director of The Magnes and to work with a superb staff to maintain and enhance this community treasure.

In this issue of Confluence, we present our distinctive “signature” as a Collection of more than 15,000 objects from the global Jewish diaspora.

It is our sacred trust to steward the third largest Judaica collection in the United States, and the only large Judaica collection in a major US research university. It is our pedagogical mission to enrich the educational experience of UC Berkeley students and the learning experience of members of the community, who visit our Collection either in person or on line.

Professor George Breslauer

This has been another great year for the Magnes! Beginning with the donation of the remarkable Peachy and Mark Levy Family Collection of Judaica and ending with the award of several large foundation grants to help us make our Collection accessible to a larger audience, The Magnes has certainly been on the move.

You may have visited our exhibition (Living by the Book) of Jewish ritual objects, as well as our exhibition and semester-long programs on the Mendelssohn family. Our Fall and Spring Openings attracted full houses.

More than a dozen UC Berkeley undergraduate and graduate students worked as research interns, conducting original research of their own and working with our curatorial staff to plan and execute exhibitions and programs. You will meet some of these students in the pages that follow.

Our influence continues to grow, globally. The Torah Ark from the ocean liner, RMS Queen Mary, will soon be on loan to museums in Massachusetts and London, UK. Oppenheim’s painting of Moses Mendelssohn is going to Wittenberg, Germany for the 500th anniversary of Luther’s theses. Our medical diploma from Padua, Italy (1682) is already on loan in Venice, Italy.

See the article about these and other loans inside this issue of Confluence.

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We have also enjoyed growing success in our fund-raising efforts. The Annual Fund, to which many of you have contributed, has grown dramatically over previous years, enabling us to field exhibitions and programs that remain free and open to the public. Foundation grants and bequests reflect the confidence many people feel in The Magnes and their identification with our mission. Thus, in Spring 2016 alone: the Walter and Elise Haas Fund awarded us $125,000; The Koret Foundation approved a $500,000 grant to The Magnes; we received a $100,000 bequest in honor of our Curator, Francesco Spagnolo; and The Fred Isaac Fund awarded us a grant to fund valuable equipment purchases. We continue discussions with other foundations and individuals about acquisitions, programming, and intensified research in the Collection.

The foundation grants will help us realize the full potential of our collection so that people throughout the world can learn still more about the Jewish people’s diasporic experiences during the past four hundred years. We will uncover more extensive information on thousands of items in the Collection and present them and their stories in exhibitions and on line. We trust that you, dear reader, have found plenty of intellectual and emotional nourishment in the exhibitions and programs we have created for your pleasure.

The coming academic year promises to be equally exciting. At the Fall Opening, we will showcase a major new exhibition on Italian Jewry. At the Spring 2017 Opening, we will unveil a unique exhibition (The Power of Attention) on the uses of ritual objects throughout Jewish history as facilitators of meditation techniques. A fuller listing of scheduled events can be found in pages that follow and on line at magnes.berkeley.edu.

Stay tuned! We look forward to informing you of additional successes in our efforts to keep The Magnes “On the Move”! Of course, we depend on contributions from our friends and supporters to maintain such a wide array of programs. In the last section of Confluence, we gratefully list the names of individuals and institutions that have contributed to The Magnes between July 2015 and June 2016.

George Breslauer Faculty Director of The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life

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Letter from the Curator Inhabiting the curatorial responsibilities of The Magnes Collection at UC Berkeley is a thrilling adventure. It involves discovering and re-discovering hidden treasures, challenging the descriptive practices of Jewish culture and moving beyond the canonical focus on texts alone, engaging communities of scholars on multi-disciplinary themes, and creating and maintaining global research networks across the US, Europe, Asia, and Israel.

The average curatorial “routine” of a day at The Magnes is a veritable tour around the day in eighty worlds. My work constantly fuses in-depth research across cultural formats, describing, teaching, dreaming, publishing, and, above all, continuously asking questions. Our treasures of manuscripts, objects, books, archival collections, musical Dr. Francesco Spagnolo scores and recordings are investigated and examined from a multiplicity of perspectives. Mysteries are acknowledged, and sometimes even solved... New acquisitions are discussed with donors, collectors, and art dealers in multiple countries. Classes and seminars are taught, with undergraduate and graduate students mentored in the rudiments of research and “collection work,” and thus exposed to an astounding variety of primary sources and modes of knowledge. Senior faculty and visiting researchers are consulted to collaborate on research, exhibitions, and colloquia. Visiting artists present their work, and interact with the inspiring setting of the collection storage, the galleries, and, more broadly, the university and its communities. Members of the community take guided tours through their own pasts.

Publications, online and in print, constantly flow. Most importantly, core questions of how collecting institutions may continue to represent and perform the role of preserving the cultural past and shaping its future, always remain in play.

Curating The Magnes Collection not only involves exploring many overlapping, conflicting, and contradictory Jewish worlds, but also, in a way, sketching them, charting them, one object at a time, and providing ways for others to do so as well, across cultural, linguistic, and ideological divides. Thanks to funding from Digital Humanities at Berkeley, I have been able to plan a new multidisciplinary research project called Mapping Diasporas. Over the past year, a working group composed of UC Berkeley faculty and graduate students, as well as web developers and filmmakers, collaborated on an exploration of Diaspora that bridges the objects in the collection with the opportunities granted us by the “Digital Renaissance.” In the coming Fall Semester, I will be teaching a new course based on this research, involving up to 40 students in a hands-on exploration of The Magnes Collection. But the real results of this project will emerge as both research and teaching will find their confluence in new exhibitions and public programs.

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Hellos and Goodbyes Introductions Zoe Lewin is a recent graduate from UC Berkeley, where she studied History of Art and Rhetoric, focusing on photography and public discourse, respectively. In her free time, Zoe loves to cook and bake, hike in the Bay Area, and check out exhibitions at galleries and museums.

During her undergraduate career at UC Berkeley, Zoe worked at The Magnes as a URAP student researcher from Fall 2013 to Spring 2016, taking part in several research projects and exhibitions. She is thrilled to be joining the staff of The Magnes as Curatorial Assistant, and is looking forward to collaborating with such a close-knit group.

Farewells In April 2016, The Magnes bid adieu to Gary Handman, our Public Services Coordinator and Librarian. Gary came to work at The Magnes in October 2012 after a 35-year career as a librarian in the UC Berkeley library. During his four years on Allston Way, Gary served as a “front of the house” contact person for reference and information questions pertaining to Magnes collections, programs, and services. In close collaboration with both The Magnes Curator and Registrar, he worked intensively to organize and inventory Magnes’ rich and diverse archival and media collections.

In his life after The Magnes, Gary tells us that he intends to catch up on the enormous stack of reading on his coffee table, to concentrate on his sideline of freelance magazine illustration, and to generally loaf and daydream. We wish him well in his post-post-retirement life.

The Magnes wishes to recognize Cal alumna and past Graduate Assistant Curator India Mandelkern on her new role as the Executive Communications Specialist at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA).

India received her Ph.D. in History in 2015 from UC Berkeley and served as a Graduate Curator at The Magnes. She co-curated Gourmet Ghettos: Modern Food Rituals, a 2014 Magnes exhibition about eating, identity and activism in Jewish life and beyond, and assisted with the program Modern Food Rituals: From the Communal Table to the Global Tasting Room.

India Mandelkern with longtime Magnes supporter Denah Bookstein

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Foundations Come Forward Thank you for helping make the 15,000-piece collection accessible to the world for scholarship, teaching and public education!

Individuals Make a Difference Fred Isaac We are immensely grateful to Fred Isaac for his multi-year support of The Magnes. Fred is a visionary; he understands that cultural institutions often find it difficult to raise funds to pay for basic equipment that is essential to the realization of their missions. We could not do justice to our Collection and our community without the technologies that Fred’s gifts have made possible for us to purchase. Last year’s gift, which was not his first to The Magnes, underwrote the purchase of a professional full-frame Nikon digital SLR camera outfit as well as a Ricoh SP5210 office copier/printer/scanner/fax machine. This year’s gift, made from The Frederick J. Isaac Fund of the Jewish Community Foundation of the East Bay, allowed us to purchase ten new office computers and ten “flat files” for collection storage. Thank you, Fred!

Vallery Feldman

Elie J. Tennenbaum and Stella Reich Tennenbaum

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Vallery Feldman donated a substantial sum to The Magnes to honor the memory of her parents, Elie Jacques Tennenbaum and Stella Tennenbaum (born Reichova). The Tennenbaum’s exemplified a will to survive and thrive in a world tortured by war. They avoided the fates of their parents, who all perished in the Holocaust, escaping Europe to China in 1940 on ships sponsored by the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee. In Shanghai, they both studied medicine at the Aurora University, where they met. Later, they made their way to the United States, married, and settled in San Francisco. Elie and Stella exemplified a determination to overcome obstacles, practice medicine, surround themselves with artistic beauty, and instill important values in their children. Elie passed away in 1999 at the age of 81; Stella passed away in 2004 at the age of 87. We at The Magnes are pleased to honor their memory.

2015-2016 Highlights Living by The Book: The Jewish Bible and the Everyday Power of Text On display: Thursday, August 27, 2015 - Friday, June 24, 2016 Curator: Francesco Spagnolo, with Daniel Fisher, Doctoral Candidate in Near Eastern Studies and Magnes Graduate Fellow (2014-2015)

Living by The Book brings together scrolls, ritual objects, clothing, furniture, and tourist memorabilia from The Magnes Collection that express culture in biblical terms with remarkable diversity and creativity, showcasing the ways text can serve as an archive of possibilities and a powerful platform for shaping everyday life.

Mizrah; Southern Germany; 1750–1800. This ornamental plaque—depicting Moses (on the right), holding his staff and the tablets with the Ten Commandments, and his older brother Aaron—is a mizrah, designating the direction to be faced during prayer: east, toward Jerusalem. Inscription: [Hebrew] “He who opens every day the doors of the gates of the East.”

Passover Haggadah

Shiviti Amulet; Morocco; 19th Century. A “shiviti” is a calligraphic devotional plaque, consisting of Hebrew texts designed to remind one of God’s omnipresence. As is typical, this “shiviti” includes in the center at the top a tetragrammaton—the four Hebrew letters yud, he, vay, he, indicating the name of God—and three psalms. The lower section contains amuletic texts, referring to the demon Lilith; three angels counter Lilith’s attempts to cause harm to newborns.

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2015-2016 Highlights Exhibition: From Mendelssohn To Mendelssohn: German-Jewish Encounters in Art, Music, and Material Culture On display: Tuesday, January 26, 2016 - Friday, December 16, 2016 Curator: Francesco Spagnolo Undergraduate Curatorial Assistant: Lauren Cooper Centered in the Magnes’ Main Gallery is the iconic painting Lavater and Lessing Visit Moses Mendelssohn, by Moritz Daniel Oppenheim (1856).

The painting is the nucleus of the year-long exhibition From Mendelssohn To Mendelssohn: German-Jewish Encounters in Art, Music, and Material Culture. It depicts an imagined visit to the residence of Moses Mendelssohn (1729-1786) by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-1781), a philosopher and Enlightenment figure, and Johann Kaspar Lavater (1741-1801), a Swiss theologian.

The artist, Moritz Daniel Oppenheim (1800-1882) was born in Hanau, Germany, and is recognized as the first modern German-Jewish painter. A theme of Oppenheim’s work, epitomized in Lavater and Lessing Visit Moses Mendelssohn, is confrontation between Jews and Christians. Moses Mendelssohn was an influential German Jew, and an inspiring figure for the Haskalah (Jewish Enlightenment). In the painting, Mendelssohn sits across from Lavater, the men leaning towards each other. A chess set sits in the foreground between the two men while Lessing looks on from behind. The depiction of the chess game between Mendelssohn and Lavater can be interpreted as an allegory for the public dispute between the two men, in which Lavater challenges Mendelssohn to embrace Christianity or refute its precepts.

The exhibition itself evokes the original setting of the painting and the history of the Mendelssohn family, including the lives and works of Moses Mendelssohn’s grandchildren, composers Fanny (1805-1847) and Felix (1809-1847), by displaying German-Jewish ritual art, prints, rare volumes, manuscripts, and other objects.

In order to help recreate the atmosphere of a salon-like space of intellectual and artistic gathering in the exhibition, a 19th-century Wieck Grand Piano (on loan from the UC Department of Music) was installed in a corner of the gallery near the painting.

The exhibition is part of The Mendelssohn Project, a series of lectures and musical performances, presented this past spring at The Magnes, in collaboration with the Office of the Dean of Arts and Humanities, the Departments of Music and History, and Cal Performances.

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2015-2016 Highlights Opening Night - The Mendelssohn Project Opening night reception was held on Tuesday, Jan. 26, for the exhibition, From Mendelssohn To Mendelssohn as well as The Mendelssohn Project, billed as “one exhibition, two historic pianos, fourteen lectures and performances.” Nearly 300 guests attended, making it one of the largest receptions ever at The Magnes.

Opening remarks were given by George Breslauer, faculty director of The Magnes, and Anthony J. Cascardi, dean of arts and humanities at UC Berkeley.

Nicholas Mathew, associate professor of music history at UC Berkeley, introduced the performance of Felix Mendelssohn’s Piano Trio No.2 in C minor, Op.66 (1845). Performers included Roger Moseley, assistant professor of musicology at Cornell University, on the Erard Grand Piano (London, 1854), accompanied by violinist Hrabba Atladottir and cellist Hannah Addario-Berry.

Cal music students performed Felix Mendelssohn’s Song Without Words on the Wieck grand piano in the gallery, where visitors were able to gather around the venerable German instrument, and participate in tours of the gallery.

Maintaining and tuning the fickle 19th-century Wieck grand piano so that it would be playable in the exhibition programs was no easy task, according to Professor Nicholas Mathew, “It was a challenge to get the Wieck up to standard. The action, basically an English action known as a Blüthner Mechanik, was shimmed and shizzled and propped up in alarming ways. It needed to have new bits machined. But I did have a new set of hammers made and fitted, modeled on the set in the Wieck’s sister instrument in the Schumannhaus in Zwickau, which is the only other playable example of this instrument.”

Other notable events associated with the Mendelssohn Project: Michael Steinberg, Brown University: Inner Voices of the Mendelssohn Family. Followed by a performance by James Davies, assistant professor of music history, and students from the Pianism seminar at UC Berkeley Adrian Daub, Stanford University: The Mendelssohns, The Piano, and the Making of the Domestic Sphere Ariana Strahl (Soprano), Nicholas Mathew (Piano): Songs by Fanny Mendelssohn, Felix Mendelssohn, and Clara Schumann Celia Applegate, Vanderbilt University: The Need for History. The Mendelssohn Family and their Search for a Past With a Future Left Coast Chamber Ensemble presents Felix Mendelssohn, Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor Nicholas McGegan, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, in conversation with Francesco Spagnolo: The Mendelssohns and Their Musical Worlds.* Followed by the screening of the documentary, Mendelssohn, The Nazis, and Me (UK, 2009, 59 min.). *Co-presented with Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra

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Magnes Collection Continues To Grow

Gift of Daniel Lieberman. Saul Raskin (1878-1966), detail, Wailing Wall, 1920, painting (oil on unstretched canvas).

From the Terezin Portfolio of Mark Podwal.

Mark Podwal (b.1945), detail, Exile, 2014-2016, acrylic, gouache, and colored pencil on paper.

Gift of Regina Lackner. The Ruth Eis Collection.

Charity Box for Hebrew Free School and Free Kitchen for Orphans and Yeshivath Chayei Olam, Jerusalem, early 20th century, enamel on tin-steel.

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Gift of Bernard and Barbro Osher. Benjamin Kopman (1887-1966), Untitled, 1958, painting (watercolor and crayon on paper).

Magnes Collection Continues To Grow

Gift of Mara Vishniac Kohn. Roman Vishniac (1897-1990), [Interior of the Anhalter Bahnhof railway terminus near Potsdamer Platz, Berlin], 1929-early 1930s, inkjet print. © Mara Vishniac Kohn, courtesy International Center of Photography.

Gift of Robert LeRoy, Pete Monchek, and Mark Monchek. Barbara Shilo, Do You Know Me?, 1998, mixed media collage.

Gift of Noah Alper. Noah’s New York Bagels, Noah’s New York Bagels tote bag (logo detail), cotton and polyester.

Gift of Marisa Scheinfeld. Marisa Scheinfeld, detail, Prayer Book, Homowack Lodge, Spring Glen, New York, 2015, chromogenic print.

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Magnes on the Move More than a Dozen Magnes Artifacts to be Displayed Throughout the World This year The Magnes received loan requests from the National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia; the Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia, Venice, Italy; the Laguna Art Museum in Laguna, California; and the New Mexico History Museum/Palace of The Governors in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Follow the map to learn where our collection items are headed

Peabody Essex Museum / Victoria and Albert Museum

Salem, Massachusetts / London, England Laguna Art Museum Laguna Beach, California Exhibition: Peter Krasnow: Maverick Modernist (June 26Sept. 25, 2016) • • • • •

Exhibition: Ocean Liners: Glamour, Speed, Style (traveling exhibition) May 20, 2017 - Nov 15, 2017.

Opens in London, Feb. 3, 2018 and will continue on display through June 10, 2018.

• Torah Ark from the Queen Mary Steamship, made by Cecil Jacob Epril (England, 1930-1937)

Under the Bridge, 1920 Portrait of Olaf Olesen, 1921 Pagan Mask, 1930 Pontifical Mask, 1930 The Symbols, 1961

National Museum of American Jewish History Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Exhibition: Permanent Core Exhibition Foundations of Freedom: 1654 – 1880 • Kiddush Cup • Defaced portrait of Rabbi Max Lilienthal (reproduction)

New Mexico History Museum/Palace of The Governors Santa Fe, New Mexico Exhibition: Sephardic Legacy: From Golden Age Spain to Contemporary New Mexico (May 20, 2016-Feb. 12, 2017) • Hanukkah lamp (Spain, 1300s) • Wedding ring (Italy, 1500s) • Payment receipt from the King of Aragon to Benveniste de la Cavalleria (Spain, 1402) • La Dédicace de la Synagogue des Juifs Portugais à Amsterdam, Bernard Picart engraving (Holland, 1733)

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Magnes on the Move The loans will include a 24-karat gold and blue enamel Italian wedding ring from the 1500s, a 1682 illuminated diploma from Italy awarded to the first Jew in Italy to become an M.D. and Ph.D., and five works by geometric modernist Peter Krasnow.

In 2017, The Magnes’ Queen Mary Torah Ark will go to the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, MA, and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, and the iconic painting Lavater and Lessing Visit Moses Mendelssohn will be shown in the exhibition Luther! 95 Treasures-95 People in Augusteum, the front building of the Luther House in Wittenberg, Germany.

Behind the Scenes with Julie Franklin Responsibility for preparing and moving artifacts belongs to Julie Franklin, who is the Registrar, Exhibitions Coordinator, and Rights Manager at The Magnes. Her titles only hint at her broad responsibilities in safekeeping The Magnes collection. “ I think of myself as a Jill of all trades,” Julie explains when describing her daily roles as risk manager, researcher and preparator.

Augusteum / Lutherhaus Wittenberg, Germany Exhibition: Luther! 95 Treasures-95 People (May 13-Nov. 17, 2017) • Lavater and Lessing visit Moses Mendelssohn, by Moritz Daniel Oppenheim (Germany, 1856)

Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia Venice, Italy Exhibition: Venice, the Jews and Europe (1516-2016) (June 18-Nov. 13, 2016) • Medical Diploma of Emmanuel Colli, University of Padua (Italy, 1682)

In addition to the work required for exhibitions, Julie spends her days readying the paintings, sculptures and objects that other museums have requested for loan. She coordinates all the activities and logistics required to successfully prepare and ship collection pieces to national and international locations. Julie is also charged with protecting the records of each object’s provenance: “I serve as the intellectual papertrail caretaker for each individual piece we hold,” she said.

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From the Magnes Collection The Flower Terrace in the Wannsee Garden Seen from the Northeast (Berlin, 1924).

The Flower Terrace in the Wannsee Garden Seen from the Northeast, is one in a series of paintings by Max Liebermann of the gardens at his lakeshore summer house in the Wannsee area of Berlin.

As the curator Barbara C. Gilbert notes, “Liebermann’s paintings of his garden environment often evoke comparisons with works by other artists of the time, especially Monet’s paintings of his gardens at Giverny. Liebermann was well aware of Monet’s garden paintings —he owned two: Manet Painting in Monet’s Garden in Argenteuil...and Poppy Field.”

The painting was anonymously gifted to The Magnes in 1980 and is on display in the Irving Rabin Collection Wing through Fall 2016. The Flower Terrace and Max Liebermann were featured in the Spring 2016 inaugural PopUp lecture delivered by Martin Jay, the Sidney Hellman Ehrman Professor of History at UC Berkeley.

Max Liebermann (July 20, 1847 – February 8, 1935) was a German Jew known mostly for his portraits and impressionist art. He spent most of his life in Berlin, the city of his birth, and died there in 1935.

Explore The Magnes Collection on Flickr: flickr.com/people/magnesmuseum

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From the Magnes Collection Torah Ark from the RMS Queen Mary --George Breslauer Were you aware that, in the late 1930’s, The RMS Queen Mary ocean liner transported beleaguered European Jews to the United States? Were you also aware that the company agreed to include a synagogue and kosher kitchen in the newly constructed ship, in deference to the faith of its Jewish passengers?

Did you know that the RMS Queen Mary was decommissioned in 1967, went into dry dock in Long Beach, California, and was converted into a hotel and museum? And did you know that, in 1992, the indefatigable founder of The Magnes, Seymour Fromer, obtained and restored this Torah Ark and incorporated it into The Magnes Collection?

Note the Art Deco style of the Ark. It was designed and constructed in Scotland. And it mirrored the Art Deco style of the furnishings within the newly-built ocean liner.

During the entire academic year, 2015-2016, this Ark has been on public display in our exhibition, Living by the Book. It stood next to two other Torah arks of very different style and design: one from twentieth-century Wyoming and the other from nineteenth-century India.

This juxtaposition illustrated how the Jewish diaspora combines Jewish universality with cultural specificity.

And this Ark, like other items in our Collection, is in demand globally. Soon we will be sending it to museums in Massachusetts and London, England, for incorporation into their temporary exhibitions. The Magnes is truly “on the move”!

An exceptionally poignant moment occurred in June of this year, when philanthropist and Magnes supporter Tad Taube visited The Magnes. When he saw the Torah Ark from the Queen Mary he remarked: “I was on that ship, escaping from Europe to the United States. In 1939. At the age of 8.”

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Meet the Student Researchers Undergraduate Research Apprentice Program (URAP)

Lily Greenberg Call

Lauren Cooper

Erin Faigin

URAP 2016. Catalogued the Postcard collection, digitized and disseminated archives online; “Italy Project” exhibition research

URAP 2013-2016. Researched From Mendelssohn To Mendelssohn & Stages of Identity exhibitions; digitized and disseminated archives online; public programs

URAP 2013-2016. Erin analyzed Yiddish

Aiko Gonzalez URAP 2016. Assisted with the Braunstein collection on the Spanish inquisition and on Jews in Latin America; Data approaches to The Magnes Collection

Christine Liu URAP 2012-2016. Catalogued the Peachy and Mark Levy Family Judaica Collection

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Clayton Hale URAP 2016. Flickr metadata reconciliation

Natalie Rusnak URAP 2016. Catalogued the postcard collection, digitized and disseminated archives online; “Italy Project” exhibition research

sheet music, catalogued archival holdings, digitized and disseminated them online

Sarah Klein URAP 2015-2016. Collection and exhibition digitization projects; Researched the “Italy Project” exhibition

Agnes Shin URAP 2015-2016. Inventoried and catalogued posters

Meet the Graduate Students Zach Bleemer / Graduate Research Fellow / Spring 2016 Zach Bleemer is a data scientist and microeconomist studying aesthetics and young person decision-making at UC Berkeley, where he is a doctoral student in economics. His research examines popular latent aesthetic categories and beliefs since 1600 across Europe and the United States. At The Magnes, Zach is leading a team of undergraduate students, in digitizing and textually organizing 30 different editions of the Passover Haggadah from the collection, published in the United States between 1840 and 2015.

Alan Elbaum / Graduate Research Fellow / Spring 2016 Alan Elbaum is a first-year medical student at the UC Berkeley-UCSF Joint Medical Program.

While at Berkeley, he is working toward a master’s degree in the history of medicine, using manuscripts from the Cairo Genizah. His project at The Magnes is based on the collection of Egyptian Karaite and Rabbanite manuscripts that were recently cataloged by Dr. Lisa Wurtele.

Shir Gal Kochavi / Curatorial Volunteer / Spring 2016 Shir Gal Kochavi is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom, where she is focusing on Post-Holocaust restitution of Jewish cultural objects, and has been a curatorial volunteer at The Magnes for the past year. Born and raised in Israel, Shir has always had an interest in Jewish cultural history and art, specifically how art is treated during times of conflict.

Yosef Rosen / Graduate Research Fellow / Fall 2015- Spring 2016 Yosef Rosen is a doctoral candidate in Jewish Studies at UC Berkeley. Yosef’s dissertation offers a new take on the emergence of Kabbalah in Spain, as told through literary forgeries, epistles, courtroom chronicles, and literary transformations in rabbinic culture. He received an MA in Jewish Thought from Hebrew University and a BA in philosophy from Yeshiva University.

While at The Magnes, Yosef researched the collection of Shiviti amulets.

Kelin Verrette / Graduate Student Intern / Spring 2016 Kelin Verrette is a current graduate student at San Francisco State University, majoring in museum studies. Kelin began her internship with The Magnes in April 2016, and collaborates with Magnes Registrar Julie Franklin on collections care and management. In the future, she is interested in using and developing digital tools to keep museums relevant and accessible to modern audiences.

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Undergraduate and Graduate Research UC Berkeley undergraduate and graduate students pursue research at The Magnes Cal students are invited to participate in research projects at The Magnes through the University of California, Berkeley Undergraduate Research Apprentice Program (URAP), a campuswide initiative designed to give Berkeley undergraduates a chance to work sideby-side with faculty.

This past spring semester, The Magnes had three Graduate Fellows and 11 URAP students, the highest number since the program’s inception. Students worked independently and in teams to investigate, analyze and explore the Magnes’ vast holdings, deploying inhouse and global resources to piece together the history and science behind the collection’s objects.

URAP students Aiko Gonzalez and Clayton Hale

Under the direction of our Curator, URAP students learned both the physical aspects of handling and moving objects and also how researchers think and gain knowledge about an object in a historical context and in relation to other items in the collection.

Student projects covered everything from translating texts to cataloging objects by analyzing their physical attributes to determining and recording the provenance of collection items. For example, URAP student Erin Faigin, a 2016 Cal graduate, translated Yiddish literary journals and other texts, work that was featured in JWeekly, a Bay Area newspaper. URAP students Lauren Cooper and Sarah Klein conducted major background research for exhibitions, and Lauren and Erin, along with several other students, presented their findings during The Magnes’ noontime PopUp Exhibitions.

Lauren Cooper, a 2016 UC Berkeley graduate (who this past year worked as undergraduate curator for the Mendelssohn project, and co-curated the exhibition, Stages of Identity), describes her three-year URAP experience and offers an inside look at the work she did at The Magnes.

Find in-depth videos on PopUps, exhibitions, book talks and other educational presentations on our YouTube channel: YouTube.com/magnesmuseum 18

A Student Researcher’s Perspective By: Lauren Cooper (URAP) Fall 2014 – Spring 2016 My first day as a Research Assistant at the Magnes, I was given seven Israeli dolls and the name of the workshop that produced them, and was asked to write catalog descriptions for them. With little cultural knowledge of Israel and no experience working with dolls or objects like them, I quickly became a detective, piecing together fragments of information so I could not only describe the dolls, but could also recreate their role in the society that produced them.

This type of object research is exciting, but a further benefit of working at a museum is that the research is not confined to the archives—it Lauren Cooper Hameskakem (Israel). Hassidic man with Torah scroll is presented to the public. Having become the house expert on the Israeli dolls, I was asked to contribute to an exhibition (Living by the Book, Fall 2015) that would include them. I selected several dolls, wrote labels, and created digital companions to the exhibit. When the exhibition opened, I had not only reconstructed histories that were nearly lost, but was proud to have also had a hand in presenting them, physically and digitally, to a public that could appreciate them as much as I did.

My experience working with the dolls proved to be just a taste of what was to come during the rest of my time at the Magnes. At the beginning of each semester, it seems, I was confronted with some idea I knew nothing about. And each time, I jumped into my new project feet first. I don’t know at this point if I want to have a career in museums. I do know that I care deeply about preserving culture, and about providing a platform for it in order to engage a public outside of the academic world. And I know that I want to find a place like the Magnes, where I am discovering something new every day.

Stages of Identity Lauren was the undergraduate curator for Stages of Identity, an exhibition this past fall featuring posters that showcased a variety of theatrical and cultural events over the past century centering on Jewish themes. Lauren spent her time working with Francesco Spagnolo in researching hundreds of posters in The Magnes’ collection, helping to select for display those with the most striking graphics and stories. She also contributed to the creation of the exhibition interpretive texts.

In terms of visual style, the posters featured in Stages of Identity could not be more diverse, ranging from traditional and folk motifs to modernism. This broad range in style reflects a cultural shift in 20th-century theater. Contrary to early-modern theater, contemporary productions often feature Jews and Jewish themes as integral to culture and society, rather than as stylized — and often culturally stereotyped — “characters.” Thus, contemporary Jewish playwrights, actors, directors, and producers appearing in modern theater posters are mentioned by name and celebrated in their roles, as the sole protagonists of a narrative that sees them voicing a globally recognized Jewish cultural identity.

Felice Pazner Malkin (b. 1929) Cruelest of All—The King. Habimah (Israel, 1953)

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This Year's Events Fall 2016 Exhibitions On View: Aug. 30-Dec. 16, 2016

By Design: American Jewish Education in the ‘World Over’ Cover Art (1946-1957) From Mendelssohn To Mendelssohn: German-Jewish Encounters in Art, Music, and Material Culture I-Tal-Yah: An Island of Divine Dew. Italian Crossroads in Jewish Culture Selections from the Peachy and Mark Levy Family Judaica Collection Max Lieberman (b. 1847) The Flower Terrace in the Wannsee Garden Seen from the Northeast (Berlin, 1924).

The Jewish World | A Book Installation (ongoing, in the auditorium)

Fall 2016 Public Programs Opening night of I-Tal-Yah: An Island of Divine Dew. Italian Crossroads in Jewish Culture Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2016

M. Daniel Passigli, Ketubbah (marriage contract), Siena, 1816, Siegfried S. Strauss Collection

Last Yiddish Heroes: Lost and Found Songs of Soviet Jews during World War II Thursday, Sept. 29; 6:30 p.m.

The Bagel and the Archive: Celebrating Noah’s Bagels Legacy at The Magnes Sunday, Nov. 13; 10 a.m. - noon Book Talk | Walter Zev Feldman. Klezmer: Music, History, and Memory Thursday, Dec. 1; 5:30 - 7:30 p.m.

Melting Pots Compared? Italian Jewry and Contemporary Israel, Sergio Della Pergola (Hebrew University of Jerusalem) Wednesday, Dec. 14; 5 - 7 p.m.

PopUp Exhibition Series-Wednesdays at noon Sept. 21; Oct. 19; 26; Nov. 2; 9; 16; 30

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Israeli Film Series Sept. 27; Nov. 1; 29

Ezekiel Schloss (1913–1987), Thanksgiving, New York, Jewish Education Committee of New York (later, the Board of Jewish Education), 1954

Spring 2017 Exhibitions Spring 2017 Exhibitions

Spring 2017 Public Programs

On View: Jan. 24-June. 23, 2017

PopUp Exhibitions Feb. 1; 8; 15; 22 March 1; 8; 15; 22; 29 April 5; 19; 26

Visual Archives: Photographs by Roman Vishniac I-Tal-Yah: An Island of Divine Dew. Italian Crossroads in Jewish Culture

Israeli Film Series Jan. 31; Feb. 22; April 5

The Power of Attention: Jewish Devotional Art & the Science of Meditation The Jewish World | A Book Installation (ongoing, in the auditorium)

Roman Vishniac, [Woman walking on crutches through ruins, Berlin], 1947 © Mara Vishniac Kohn, courtesy International Center of Photography

Ya’aqov Meir bar Abba Shalom Kashiuf [ Shiviti plaque], Alexandria, Egypt, 1914-1915

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The Magnes Leadership Circle & Friends of The Magnes For more than half a century, The Magnes has provided access to unique resources that have allowed each generation to find its own story in the rich texts, vibrant images, and unique sounds of Jewish culture. Your support allows the collection to thrive as a treasured resource that advances research, scholarship and community programs.

We are grateful to our many supporters, which include The Magnes Leadership Circle, a special giving category for donors who generously provide The Magnes with annual gifts of $1,000 or more.

M AG N E S L E A D E R S H I P C I R C L E LUMINARY CIRCLE ($100,000+)

Fred Isaac in memory of Rob Ruby

Walter & Elise Haas Fund

Jan H. Kessler | Randall E. Kessler

Leo B. Helzel | Florence Helzel

Raymond Lifchez

Helzel Family Foundation

Valerie E. Sopher

Koret Foundation Peachy Levy l Mark C. Levy The Magnes Museum Foundation Gerald B. Rosenstein

Sue Ginsberg Bachman | Ronald P. Bachman

VISIONARY CIRCLE ($25,000+)

Henry Baer

Vallery Feldman | Marc Feldman in memory of Elie J. Tennenbaum, M.D. & Stella Reich Tennenbaum, M.D.

Joan Bieder

Hellman Foundation

Carol H. Field | John L. Field

PARTNER’S CIRCLE ($10,000+)

Amy R. Friedkin | Morton Friedkin

Professor George Breslauer

Patricia H. Gibbs | Richard Gibbs

The Frederick J. Isaac Fund

Evelyn Graetz | Roberto D. Graetz

We would be honored to have you join us at any level.

Debra Trubowitch Cohn | Barry W. Cohn

You can GIVE ONLINE at HJWF.CFSLFMFZ FEV NBHOFT or

Bernard Osher Jewish Philanthropies Foundation

send your donation to The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life, University of California, 2121 Allston Way, Berkeley, CA, 94720-6300.

DIRECTOR’S CIRCLE ($5,000+) Hope M. Alper | Noah C. Alper

Michael J. Baker | Linda S. Baker

Rita Blitt | Irwin Blitt Diana J. Cohen | William A. Falik

Frances M. Greenberg Lorrie Levin Greene | Richard L. Greene Adele M. Hayutin Lawrence B. Helzel | Rebekah S. Helzel

Joan D. Grossman

Deborah Kirshman | David K. Kirshman

Susan S. Libitzky | Moses Libitzky

George Leitmann | Nancy L. Leitmann

Barbara Goor Rothblatt | Sheldon Rothblatt

Joan M. Mann | Roger A. Mann

Marian Scheuer Sofaer | Abraham Sofaer

Phyllis Moldaw

COLLECTORS ($2,500+) Mathilde Albers Ruth Arnhold Donald Chaiken Jean Colen | Sanford Colen Sandra P. Epstein | Edwin M. Epstein

Aaron Marcus

Reiko E. Niimi | Josef L. Leitmann Barbara C. Rosenberg | Richard M. Rosenberg Barbara A. Schick Dana Bloom Shapiro | Gary J. Shapiro Sheila Sosnow | Richard Nagler Roselyne C. Swig

Herbert J. Friedman | Marianne Levee Friedman

Temple Isaiah

Lisa & Douglas Goldman Fund

Virginia Saftlas Vogel | David J. Vogel

John & Marcia Goldman Foundation Noreen Green | Ian Drew Catherine B. Hartshorn | Richard M. Buxbaum

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Mary Ann Tonkin

CURATORS ($1,000+)

Ilene Weinreb | Samuel H. Mesnick Diane B. Wilsey

Honor Roll FRIENDS OF THE MAGNES F R I E N D S O F T H E M AG N E S James Blume

Janet King | George King

Judith F. Broude | Samuel G. Broude

Marion R. Kramer

Gloria Burke | Jerome S. Burke

Stephan J. Krieger | Arlene Epp Krieger

Victor Alterescu | Karen B. Alterescu

Susan W. Goldstein | Andrew B. Kivel

Evelyn L. Apte | Robert Z. Apte

Kenneth Kofman

Lee K. Bevis

Marie-Anne K. Neimat | Andrei M. Manoliu

Bonnie Burt | Mark I. Liss

Lois W. Marcus | Gary B. Marcus

June A. Cheit

Janet A. Martin

Ann A. Devereux| David A. Cheit

Doris Marx

Frances L. Dinkelspiel | Gary D. Wayne

CONSERVATORS ($500+)

Denah S. Bookstein Maxine Brownstein Susan K. Coliver | Robert G. Herman Sam Davis | Joanne Cuthbertson Sara Engel | Marvin L. Engel Susan Epstein | William D. Epstein Harold G. Friedman | Jennifer L. Friedman Frances Koshland Geballe | Theodore H. Geballe Andrew N. Gerson Marsha Guggenheim | Ralph J. Guggenheim Steven D. Hallert | Phyllis Hallert Ruth Heller | Alfred E. Heller Hanna Haim Hindawi | David S. Hindawi

Samuel Noily | Daphne Noily Varda Rabin Marilyn Y. Waldman | Murry J. Waldman Kathryn Mickle Werdegar | David Werdegar Victoria Bleiberg Zatkin | Steven R. Zatkin

Anne Packer | Lester Packer Herman Rose Dorothy R. Saxe

Leonore S. Foorman

Howard K. Schachman

Selma Forkash | Paul E. Forkash

Helen S. Schulak Elizabeth Spander | Arthur Spander Ann Swidler | Claude S. Fischer Mel R. Wacks Gerald Westheimer

Michael L. Goldstein | Susan N. Bales Miriam J. Gauss | Arthur B. Gauss Richard M. Greenberg, M.D. Ann Fingarette Hasse | Erich S. Gruen

Judith L. Bloom

Steven H. Oliver | Nancy K. Oliver

Judith Espovich | Jay H. Espovich

Alvin H. Baum Jr. Dale F. Block | Stephen E. Block

Sachiko Minowa | John J. Riley

Carolyn B. Dundes

SCHOLARS (250+) Barbara A. Berger

Ruth V. Meltsner | Arnold J. Meltsner

Lorraine Honig

Names listed are for pledges, pledge payments, and gifts of $250+ made between July 1, 2015 and June 30, 2016

Beth Davis Karren | Fred L. Karren Irene Kim | Richard Gampell

In-Kind Donations The Magnes Collection wishes to recognize this year’s in-kind donations: • Noah Alper donated the Noah’s New York Bagels Collection (1989-1996), including memorabilia documenting the early history of Noah’s New York Bagels • Funding for the purchase of Mark Podwal’s Terezin Portfolio was provided by Henry Baer, Sara Engel, Marvin L. Engel, Hanna Haim Hindawi, David Salim Hindawi, Lois W. Marcus, Gary B. Marcus, Varda Rabin, and Barbara A. Schick • Mara Vishniac Kohn donated 20 prints from the Roman Vishniac Archive at the International Center of Photography, and funding from Moses and Susan Libitzky supported the acquisition and curation of the gift

• Regina Lackner added significantly to the archive of Ruth Eis and artifacts to add to the Eis Collection, including an Alms Box • Robert LeRoy, Pete Monchek, and Mark Monchek donated Barbara Shilo’s original art that makes up the project, Silent Voices Speak • The Daniel Lieberman Estate donated the Saul Raskin painting, The Wailing Wall • Bernard and Barbro Osher donated two paintings, a Kopman watercolor (untitled) and an Aronson oil painting, The Healer • Photographer Marisa Scheinfeld donated one of her color photographs Prayer Book, Homowack Lodge, Spring Glen, New York (2015), from her recently published book: The Borscht Belt: Revisiting the Remains of America’s Jewish Vacationland All in-kind donations are now part of the permanent holdings of The Magnes, and are being catalogued by our collection staff.

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The memorial lanterns and remembrance wall were created by artist Helen Burke, and are recovered fragments from the Jo Naymark Holocaust Memorial (c.1980), which was part of the Swig Camp Institute, a sleep-away camp for teenagers operated by the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (now known as the Union for Reform Judaism) in Saratoga, California.

Memorial Lanterns Ongoing display in the lobby of The Magnes The six lanterns are on loan from Barry and Debra Cohn, whose generous support funded their installation.

Remembrance Wall On permanent display in the lobby of The Magnes.

Installation of the wall was made possible by funds provided by the Naymark family.

Confluence 2016 Editor: Leah Sherwood; Designer: Jeff Garrett; Cover Photo: Laura Turbow; Photographers: Ives Mozelsio, Erik Nelson; Sibila Savage; Laura Turbow; Contributing writers: Pulastya Bagga; Andrea Daniel