My Family Story Sneak Peek!
Last Sunday, over 200 people attended the JMM’s latest exhibition opening for Remembering Auschwitz: History, Holocaust and Humanity. We are so grateful to the Holocaust survivors and their families that joined us that morning and took part in the art installation, Holocaust Memory Reconstruction: A Sacred Culture Rebuilt. This installation commissioned by Lori Shocket and the Human Element Project, featured collages that were created by the survivors and their families documenting their lives from the past to the present. What touched me most about the morning was watching these families (many inter-generational) looking at the collages and watching having younger family members call out, “Wow, I did not know that,” or “You never told me that before.” These younger family members were learning about their family narratives and creating a “strong inter-generational self”, as described by psychologist, Marshall Duke from Emory University.
Watching this interaction between family members got me thinking about next week’s My Family Story Exhibition in partnership with Beit Hatfutsot, The Museum of the Jewish People in Israel. Area students from Beth Tfiloh Dahan Community School, Baltimore Hebrew Congregation and Bolton Street Synagogue have been on a journey, interviewing family members and researching their own family stories and learning about their family narratives. These students have created art installations to reflect the research, interviews and stories that they have learned from their own families. The journey connects students to their personal stories, to their family stories, and to the greater story of the Jewish People joining many from Israel and around the Jewish world who are also participating in Beit Hatfutsot’s My Family Story program
The student’s projects will be judged at the exhibition based on a rubric that includes four points, Jewish peoplehood, depth of research, aesthetics and creativity. The projects will be scored and two winners from each school will be chosen and those projects will be sent on to Beit Hatfutsot and their museum staff has the responsibility of picking 40 international winners who will win a free trip to Israel. The projects will be displayed at the My Family Story exhibition later in June. Over the past two years, area students and their projects have been selected to participate in the international exhibition. Our staff at the JMM is hopeful to make it three in a row!
The My Family Story Exhibition will be on display at the Jewish Museum of Maryland from Tuesday, March 14th – Sunday, March 19th. Here is a sneak peak of some of the works in progress from the students at Bolton Street Synagogue…..
