The First Jewish Museum in the World, Vienna 1895

The Jewish Museum Vienna was founded in 1895 and was the first of its kind in the world. The collection focused on the history of Eastern European Judaism, since a large number of Vienna’s Jews had their roots in that part of the world. It brought together and exhibited everyday and ritual objects from Hungary, Galicia and Moravia that in many cases had been forgotten or abandoned following the emancipation of the Jews in the Monarchy and through secularization.The exhibition, which will show a selection of the inventory of the first Jewish museum in the world, will give visitors an idea of the way in which the (Jewish) identity was developing at the start of the twentieth century.What was behind the establishment of this pioneering museum? What objects were collected and why? What does the collection say about the collectors? What traditions were fostered and what was the impact of the confrontation with Jewish history? How could objects with ritual significance be endowed with a cultural meaning in a museum environment? What was the ethnographic significance of the collection? What was the value of the international exchange involving Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Galicia and Austria? These questions will be addressed with the aid of around 100 unique objects from the archives of the Jewish Museum Vienna. Exhibition spaces: - Budapest Jewish Museum and Archive - Zalaegerszeg Urban exhibition hall (former Synagogue) - Keszthely Helikon Museum in Festeticsca-castle - Szeged Exhibition-place not yet fixed - Debrecen Big Reformed Church - Pécs Exhibition-place not yet fixed Mai – December 2005