Sample Sources
The sources below are those contained in our three curated collections—covering themes of Passover, Gender Roles, and Holocaust Resistance. They represent a fraction of the thousands of sources that will be available when the full site launches in 2024.
Jewish Scholar
Katherine M. Cohen created a number of sculptures that explored Jewish themes, including Jewish Scholar. She also sculpted, on commission, portrait busts of prominent Philadelphia Jews, such as Judge…
The Sleeping Messiah
Glicenstein depicted the Jewish Messiah as a semi-nude figure in the classical style, with bowed head and tethered to his seat. It received early recognition, admired by Rodin and praised in the…
Yorkville Swastika
The Photo League was notable for the large number of women who participated in it; about one-third of its members were women. Vivian Cherry’s work was influential in shaping the style and iconography…
The Ages of Man
Let but the son of earth Remember from his birth That in the end He shall return: As at his birth he was, So shall he be.“Arise and prosper,” say ye unto himOf five years, whose…
In the Port
You strangers with the broad, thick-veined hands,
Crooked legs and faces hard as leather,
Smelling of sea and tar
And of the rust of thick anchor chains;
Oh, you, strangers to all nations and tongues…
Homage to the Six Million
Few works by Louise Nevelson allude to Jewish themes. Homage to the Six Million is one of the exceptions. She said of her sculpture that she hoped it would create “a living presence of a people who…
The Eternal Love Song: A Picture of Labor Life
Scene: A small garret room. A door is set in a deep recess at the back; there is another door at right. It is night. Several small children are bedded on wooden benches, and several more are asleep in…
Portrait of Emma Lazarus
The socially conscious writer Emma Lazarus (1849–1887) grew up in an established Sephardic family in New York. Lazarus’s eloquent essays, emotive poetry, and insightful translations—particularly of…
Tikvatenu (Our Hope)
At the request of a well-known patriot
Our hope is not yet lost
That hope of ages
To return to the land of our fathers
To the city where David dwelt
As long as hope remains in our hearts
The…
The Jewish Character of Spinoza’s Teaching
Whoever reads Spinoza’s Theological-Political Treatise, his letters, and even his Hebrew grammar, will recognize and avow that Spinoza was, relative to his times in Amsterdam, if not a great scholar…
A Women’s Gathering
The cloak makers have hit upon an outstanding plan. Everybody knows that the greatest enemies of strikes are often the wives of the strikers themselves. That which the bosses cannot achieve with money…
The Making of the Modern Jew
For a half-millennium the Jew, rejected by the world, had secluded himself within ghetto walls, unconcerned with what lay without. But the day came when the world…