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22 December 2020, 18:27

Exhibition of Jewish culture to go on view in Belarus' National History Museum

MINSK, 22 December (BelTA) – The National History Museum of Belarus will put on display restituted items of Jewish culture. The exhibition will open 28 December, BelTA learned from director of the museum Pavel Sapotko.

“We are working to restitute items that were part of our collection. We are in talks with Israel's museums over the return of some artifacts that belonged to our museum. In 1924, our establishment, which had been named the Belarusian State Museum until 1930, had a Jewish exposition. During the war, the exhibits were taken to Germany. Later, they somehow turned up in Israel, although they had our markings,” Pavel Sapotko noted.

According to him, the exhibition of Jewish heritage will feature many interesting items, including an 18th-century Hanukkah menorah and a unique 18th-century Aron Kodesh (Torah ark) from a synagogue in Uzlyany (Pukhovichi District). The exhibition will also showcase paintings of famous Belarusian-Jewish artist Yehuda Pen, graphic works of Yankel Kruger, and museum's documents of the 1920s-1930s.

In 2019, the National History Museum received several items. “Thanks to the markings, we were able to determine that the artifacts were part of the pre-war holdings of the Belarusian State Museum, including 22 items of Jewish culture. We also received a message from the Israel Museum in Jerusalem about the item ‘Kabbalistic Amulet' that had a marking of the Belarusian State Museum. This prompted us to continue searching for such exhibits. All in all, we have restituted ten artifacts with our markings,” the organizers of the exhibition noted.

The exhibition has been organized thanks to the Belarusian president's grant and arranged in association with the Museum of Jewish History and Culture in Belarus, the National Archives, and the National Art Museum of Belarus.

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