NYC Museum of Jewish Heritage Reopens Sept. 13

The Museum of Jewish Heritage  – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust reopens to the public on Sunday, Sept. 13, with new reduced hours, timed-ticket admission and face mask requirements.

Auschwitz. Not long ago. Not far Away.

Visitors are encouraged to use their own smartphones and earphones to access the Auschwitz exhibition’s audio guide (which is available in multiple languages), though the Museum plans to have earphones available for purchase, as well.

While in-person group tours will not be available, virtual tours, including of the Auschwitz exhibition and gallery visits for adult and student groups, will be launched in September.

Produced by the international exhibition firm Musealia and the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Poland, the groundbreaking exhibition Auschwitz. Not long ago. Not far away. is the largest ever on Auschwitz with more than 700 original objects and 400 photographs.

The extension is the second since the exhibition opened in May 2019, and  responds to the record number of visitors the exhibition had drawn to the Museum until its closure in early March 2020, and because of the temporary closure due to the pandemic.

As of March 13, when MJH closed because of the NYC lockdown, more than 168,000 people – including more than 35,000 students – from across the country and globe visited the exhibition.

The Nazis exterminated some six million Jews during during World War II, including an estimated 90 percent of all Jewish children in occupied Europe, and another million or more “undesirables”, including political prisoners, Soviet prisoners of war, those with disabilities and bi-racial children that were the offspring of Germany’s history in Colonial Africa.

Recently, Auschwitz. Not long ago. Not far away. was awarded the 2020 European Heritage / Europa Nostra Award in the category of Education Training and Awareness-Raising — the most prestigious award in the field of European heritage. The Award jury said the exhibition “preserves the memory of one of the worst episodes in the history of humanity and is based on deep, scientific, historical research. It succeeded in recreating the emotional experience of visiting the real site, which is challenging for a travelling exhibition and is thanks in part to the richness of the content.”

NYCOTC Editor Evelyn Kanter – who lost relatives in Auschwitz – visited the exhibit when it first opened.

Here is my review.

Featuring more than 700 original objects and 400 photographs, mainly from the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, the exhibition allows visitors to experience artifacts from more than 20 international museums and institutions on view for the first time in the North America, including hundreds of personal items—such as suitcases, eyeglasses, and shoes—that belonged to survivors and victims of Auschwitz.

Other artifacts include: concrete posts that were part of the fence of the Auschwitz camp; part of an original barrack for prisoners from the Auschwitz III-Monowitz camp; a desk and other possessions of the first and the longest-serving Auschwitz commandant Rudolf Höss; a gas mask used by the SS; Picasso’s Lithograph of Prisoner; and an original German-made Model 2 freight train car used for the deportation of Jews to the ghettos and extermination camps in occupied Poland.

Last fall, added to the exhibition was a shofar (a ram’s horn that is made into a special wind instrument used during Jewish High Holiday services) that was hidden and clandestinely blown in Auschwitz.

Visit  Auschwitz.nyc for map and directions

Museum of Jewish Heritage Online Programming

MJH continues to  expand its successful FREE online programming for the general public, students, and teachers.

Online programming has made it possible for more New Yorkers and people across the country and world to engage with the Museum. Since the Museum went virtual on March 15 to date, there have been more than 100,000 program participants.

These online programs are scheduled in August.  If you miss any live, they can be viewed later

August 11 – Family Papers: A Sephardic Journey Through the Twentieth Century

August 18 – Generally Speaking – Stephanie Butnick in conversation with David Wallis

August 20 – Demagogue: The Life and Long Shadow of Senator Joe McCarthy

Click here for more online programs.