Community - Philadelphia Museum Of Jewish Art

The Philadelphia Museum of Jewish Art (PMJA), founded in 1975, presents contemporary art exhibits that illuminate the Jewish experience. Organizing three solo and group shows a year, the Philadelphia Museum of Jewish Art exhibits work by artists of diverse backgrounds. In addition to the special exhibits, the Museum features a permanent collection of works by artists including William Anastasi, Chaim Gross, Shelley Spector, Boaz Vaadia and Roman Vishniac, all of whom exhibited at the PMJA.

Located at Congregation Rodeph Shalom, 615 North Broad Street, Philadelphia, the PMJA is free and open to the public. (Entrance and parking on Mount Vernon Street.)

Hours
Monday–Thursday: 10–4
Friday: 10–2
Hours are subject to change: please call (215) 627-6747 to confirm

Current Exhibit

Landscapes for Humanity - Paintings by Batya F. Kuncman
August–November 2010
Artist's Reception & Gallery Talk
Tuesday, September 21, 6:30 - 8:30pm
Free and Open to the Public

This series is about human potential and the divine nature of life, the revelation in existence.The series expressed the hope in cosmic accountability, in a reality hidden from our eyes. By isolating these infants from the world of older humans the focus is on the intrinsic meaning of being human and the human condition at its most fragile yet most promising. The paintings raise questions about the meaning of life, justice, eternity, and the ambiguous relationship between “illusion” and what we call “truth.” - Batya F. Kuncman

Previous Exhibits

ON WINGS OF PRAYER”
Laurie Wohl
UNWEAVINGS
September 11 - December 7, 2009

Zoe Coehn
What Was Our Vision: Sixteen Scenes from Wandering in the Desert
July 10 - August 16, 2009
Taking shape in Zoë Cohen’s desert visions are the artistic and spiritual explorations of a twenty-first century artist. Imagined in them are the millennia-old revelations of her ancestors, the progenitors and early practitioners of Judaism. Intrigued by earth- and female-centered traditions that predated and helped to shape monotheistic belief and practice—but have since been sublimated or disavowed—Cohen sought out images of ancient Near Eastern art. She culled from them a collection of figures, shapes, and symbols that resonated with her growing Jewish belief and observance.

Hand To Hand: Photographs by Zeva Oelbaum
March 26 - June 26, 2009
Opening Thursday, March 26 at 7:00pm
In Hand to Hand, Zeva Oelbaum presents a body of work literally taken from the pages of history. Having grown up with stacks of Hebrew books relegated to her family’s basement, Oelbaum was fascinated by the scribbles and markings she found in their endpapers (with paper being a rare and expensive commodity in the 19th century and earlier, a book’s endpapers were often used as “note pads” for making lists, practicing spelling, and recording purchases). Manipulating imagery from her family’s books and those from Jewish libraries and archives, Oelbaum transforms markings written in multiple languages--Latin, Russian, German, Polish, Aramaic, and Yiddish--immortalizing the inherent visual lyricism in words and scribbles inscribed in books that, like the people who owned and/or studied them, existed and persisted through the geographic and linguistic transmutations of the Jewish Diaspora.

Visionary Biblical Sculpture: Found Object Constructions by Howard Lerner
September 5 - November 7, 2008
Renown New York artist, Howard Lerner creates magnificent works which bring the viewer closer the mysteries behind Biblical stories. In his sculpture one can feel that he tangibly recreates these ancient interactions between God and man into image and word. Using found objects, the discarded remnants of our civilization for sculptural material, he weaves and integrates these stories into the individual pieces. Through his interest in yoga meditation and the spiritual figures from our Torah, the interconnections and similarities sparked within him a great dialogue between these great cultural and spiritual paths. In each construction he drew upon these two great traditions for inspiration.

GATHERING SPARKS: The Art of Siona Benjamin
December 10, 2008 - March 10, 2009
Sonia. Benjamin is a Jew who grew up in India, a predominately Hindu and Muslin society, and was educated in Catholic and Zoroastrian schools. Now living in America, Ms. Benjamin has always reflected upon the cultural boundary zones in which she has lived; “Now living in the multicultural United States, I feel a strong need to make art that will speak to my audience of our similarities, not our differences.” Ms. Benjamin received an MFA in painting from Southern Illinois University and an MFA in theater set design from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.