Jewish Museum Vienna
Encyclopedia
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
. The present museum was founded in 1988 in the Palais Eskeles
Palais Eskeles
Palais Eskeles is a palace in Vienna, Austria.It was owned by the Jewish noble Eskeles family. Today it houses the Jewish Museum Vienna.-External links:*...
in the Dorotheergasse, Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
, and has distinguished itself by a very active programme of exhibitions.
History
The first Jewish Museum in Vienna, founded in 1896, was the first Jewish museum in the world of its sort. It was supported and run by the "Society for the Collection and Preservation of Artistic and Historical Memorials of Jewry". By 1913, when it moved into the Talmud-Thora-School in LeopoldstadtLeopoldstadt
Leopoldstadt is the 2nd municipal District of Vienna . There are inhabitants over . It is situated in the heart of the city and, together with Brigittenau , forms a large island surrounded by the Danube Canal and, to the north, the Danube. It is named after Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor...
with 3,400 objects, it had already moved premises several times. Immediately after the Anschluss
Anschluss
The Anschluss , also known as the ', was the occupation and annexation of Austria into Nazi Germany in 1938....
by Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
in 1938 the museum was closed, and its contents were distributed among the Museum of Ethnology
Vienna Museum of Ethnology
thumb|The Museum of Ethnolog is housed in a wing of the [[Hofburg Imperial Palace]].thumb|InteriorThe Museum of Ethnology in Vienna is the largest anthropological museum in Austria, established in 1876. It currently resides in the Hofburg Imperial Palace and houses a quarter million ethnographical...
(Museum für Völkerkunde), the Natural History Museum
Naturhistorisches Museum
The Naturhistorisches Museum Wien or NHMW is a large museum located in Vienna, Austria.The collections displayed cover , and the museum has a website providing an overview as a video virtual tour....
(Naturhistorisches Museum Wien) and other repositories. The Natural History Museum used its new acquisitions to mount the anti-Semitic exhibition "The Corporeal and Spiritual Properties of the Jews".
On 31 December 1964 a little Jewish museum was opened in the newly-built Desider-Friedmann-Hof in Tempelgasse 3, but received scarcely any public attention. It closed for renovation work in 1967 and was never reopened.
In 1986 the establishment of a new Jewish museum in Vienna was announced by the then Bürgermeister, Helmut Zilk
Helmut Zilk
Helmut Zilk was an Austrian journalist and politician in the Austrian Social Democratic Party.- Biography :...
, in New York at the opening of the exhibition "Vienna 1900 - Art, Architecture and Design". On the foundation committee, among many others, were representatives of the Austrian state, the city of Vienna, the Jewish Community in Vienna, the Vienna Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
and Helmut Zilk.
After its foundation in 1988 as a limited company under the management of director Christian Cap the museum was given the management of the Max Berger Collection and the IKG Collection. In 1993 Martin Schlaff
Martin Schlaff
Martin Schlaff is an Austrian entrepreneur who was occupied in trade with East Germany before the German reunification. According to the German parliament's investigations, Schlaff was an unofficial employee of the Stasi...
presented to the city of Vienna his collection of antisemitica, containing about 5,000 objects, and covering a period from 1490 to 1946, so that they could be catalogued and prepared for a major exhibition.
In 1993 the Palais Eskeles
Palais Eskeles
Palais Eskeles is a palace in Vienna, Austria.It was owned by the Jewish noble Eskeles family. Today it houses the Jewish Museum Vienna.-External links:*...
in the Dorotheergasse in Vienna was put at the disposal of the museum by the auction house Dorotheum
Dorotheum
The Dorotheum, established in 1707, is one of the world's oldest auction houses. It has its headquarters in Vienna on the Dorotheergasse and is the largest auction house in both Continental and German-speaking Europe. Besides auctions, the retail sector also plays a major role in Dorotheum's...
. Julius H. Schoeps, director of the Moses Mendelssohn Zentrum für europäisch-jüdische Studien at the University of Potsdam
University of Potsdam
The University of Potsdam is a German university, situated across four campuses in Potsdam, Brandenburg, including the New Palace of Sanssouci and the Park Babelsberg.- Profile :...
, was appointed director.
On 24 November 1994 Paul Grosz, president of the Israelitische Kultusgemeinde Wien
Israelitische Kultusgemeinde Wien
The Israelitische Kultusgemeinde Wien is the body that represents Vienna’s Jewish community. Today, the IKG has around 7000 members...
, opened the museum library.
In 1995/1996 the Palais Eskeles was given its present shape by the Viennese team of architects eichinger oder knechtl. The modernisation created more convenient display spaces and increased storage, and added a coffee house, the Café Teitelbaum, and a specialist bookshop, the Bookshop Singer. With the reopening of the premises and the end of the development phase of the museum Schoeps resigned as director and passed the artistic direction of the museum to its long-serving project coordinator, Karl Albrecht-Weinberger.
Museum Judenplatz
On 28 September 1998 the foundation stone of the new offsite premises in the Misrachi-Haus on the JudenplatzJudenplatz
Judenplatz is a town square in Vienna's Innere Stadt that was the center of Jewish life and the Viennese Jewish Community in the Middle Ages. It is located in the immediate proximity of Am Hof square, Schulhof, and Wipplingerstraße. It exemplifies the long and eventful history of the city and the...
was laid. In the Museum Judenplatz, opened on 25 October 2000, the social, cultural and religious life of the Jews of Vienna is documented through the Middle Ages up to the pogrom
Pogrom
A pogrom is a form of violent riot, a mob attack directed against a minority group, and characterized by killings and destruction of their homes and properties, businesses, and religious centres...
of the First Vienna Geserah of 1421. In the excavation space some 4.5 metres below the modern street level can be seen the foundations of the medieval synagogue
Synagogue
A synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer. This use of the Greek term synagogue originates in the Septuagint where it sometimes translates the Hebrew word for assembly, kahal...
.