Golden Thread Ensemble presents Yiddish Songs of Social Change, a program that explores the nature and dynamics of social change in the 20th century, featuring new arrangements for string quintet by Craig Judelman. Covering a wide array of topics including shifting opportunities for women, the struggle for workers' rights, tensions between religious and secular movements, assimilation and relationship with the outside world, this program gives context and voice to the myriad changes and social struggles faced by Ashkenazi communities of the last century. The ensemble itself reflects this evolving identity as it straddles the line between traditional klezmer kapelye and contemporary art ensemble.
Featuring an all-star ensemble made up of beloved Yiddish vocalists Lorin Sklamberg and Sasha Lurje, accompanied by five of the international klezmer scene's leading string players - Craig Judelman, Abigale Reisman, Lysander Jaffe, Raffi Boden, and Kirsten Lamb - this project incorporates sounds from klezmer music, Yiddish theatre, folk song, cantorial and classical music in a program that is equal parts story-telling, chamber music and klezmer concert. As the world around us presents increasing challenges and our communities feel more polarized than ever, this program inspires us to take strength from our tradition and appreciate the progress we've made, celebrating the power of song to strengthen our resolve and build solidarity as we work to fulfill the central Jewish value of repairing the world.
How do we relate to—and hold—our family’s past? Is it through technology? Through spirit? Art, poetry, music? Or is it through the resonances we look for in ourselves? In Artificial, we meet the Kurzweils, a family of creators who are preserving their history through unusual means. At the center is renowned inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil, who has long been saving the documents of his deceased father, Fredric, an accomplished conductor and pianist from Vienna who fled the Nazis in 1938. Once, Fred’s life was saved by his art: an American benefactor, impressed by Fred’s musical genius, sponsored his emigration to the United States just before Kristallnacht. Now, Fred has returned. Through AI and salvaged writing, Ray is building a chatbot that writes in Fred’s voice, and he enlists his daughter, cartoonist Amy Kurzweil, to help him ensure the immortality of their family’s fraught inheritance. Amy’s deepening understanding of her family’s traumatic uprooting resonates with the creative life she fights to claim in the present, as Amy and her partner, Jacob, chase jobs, and each other, across the country. Kurzweil evokes an understanding of accomplishment that centers conversation and connection, knowing and being known by others.
In this exclusive program, members will be guided through our permanent exhibit The Holocaust: What Hate Can Do focusing explicitly on the role of laws, lawyers, judges, and law enforcement officers in Germany and occupied territories. Special attention will be paid to the role of these professions in the furtherment of antisemitism and genocide throughout the Holocaust.
This exhibition tour will be led by Leah Dukes, Museum Educator Manager.
Leah Dukes is a trained academic historian and earned her BA in history and BS in secondary education from the College of Charleston; MA in Holocaust and Genocide Studies from Stockton University; and is currently a doctoral candidate in Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Gratz College where she is finishing her dissertation.
Members do not need to sign-in when registering.
This lecture by distinguished Czech writer, historian, and Holocaust researcher Pavel Batel will address the pivotal role of the Terezín Ghetto and Concentration camp during the Nazi occupation of World War II. Batel will discuss the purpose of the ghetto and how it served to deceive the world. He will also talk about the conditions in the camp and specifically focus on the youth movements in Terezín led by Rabbi Leo Baeck and Freddy Hirsch. Thanks to these leaders, Terezín did not break the spirits of the youth and they were able to support each other and maintain their dignity against all odds.
This lecture by distinguished Czech writer, historian, and Holocaust researcher Pavel Batel will address the pivotal role of the Terezín Ghetto and Concentration camp during the Nazi occupation of World War II. Batel will discuss the purpose of the ghetto and how it served to deceive the world. He will also talk about the conditions in the camp and specifically focus on the youth movements in Terezín led by Rabbi Leo Baeck and Freddy Hirsch. Thanks to these leaders, Terezín did not break the spirits of the youth and they were able to support each other and maintain their dignity against all odds.
On this live-streamed walking tour, we will explore the history of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and the context in which it took place. Beginning on April 19, 1943, the Uprising was the largest act of military resistance undertaken by Jews during World War II and marked the first significant civic uprising in occupied Europe. We’ll visit key sites related to the Uprising, including the locations where intense battles took place and where Jewish fighters made their stand. Along the way, you’ll hear powerful stories of the bravery and determination of the Jewish resistance fighters who, against overwhelming odds, fought for their freedom and dignity against the Nazi forces. This tour will shed light on their extraordinary courage and the lasting impact of their resistance. Co-presented with Wowzitude.
In the spring of 1939, a Jewish couple from Philadelphia traveled into the heart of Nazi Germany to carry out a daring mission – rescuing Jewish children from the oncoming horrors of the Holocaust and bringing them to safety in the United States.
Nominated for an Emmy award for Outstanding Historical Programming, 50 Children tells the never-before-told story of Gilbert and Eleanor Kraus and how they were able to save the lives of a group of young children who otherwise would likely have perished in the Holocaust.
Following the screening, there will be a talkback with the film's director and producer, Steven Pressman.
This annual academic conference focuses on telling the stories of Jews from Arab Lands who lost everything after the creation of the State of Israel when more than 900,000 Jews living in Muslim countries were displaced, left, or forcibly removed from countries which they had called home for thousands of years. Whether it was the Jews of Egypt, who were expelled by Nasser, their passports stamped “Leaving Never to Return” or Syrian Jews who were imprisoned in their homes, many Sephardic Jews fled for their lives, leaving behind land, property, and valuables. Speakers from around the globe will focus on different aspects of the Jewish experience in Arab countries.
In commemoration of Yom Hashoah, the Museum, in collaboration with the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding (FFEU), will host a conversation between H.E. Yerzhan Ashikbayev, Ambassador of the Republic of Kazakhstan to the United States and Rabbi Marc Schneier, President of FFEU. This discussion will highlight the role Kazakhstan played in helping the Jewish people during the Holocaust as they fled eastward and is FFEU's inaugural conversation series at the Museum.
The Allied leaders rarely spoke directly about the Holocaust in public. When Churchill and Stalin alluded to Nazi mass murder of civilians in early speeches, they said much less than they knew. Not until December 1942 did Allied governments issue a joint statement about Nazi Germany’s policy of exterminating the Jews of Europe. Roosevelt deferred his own public statement until March 1944. Why didn’t these leaders speak up sooner?
Through close readings of public and private statements,
Richard Breitman, an acclaimed author and distinguished emeritus professor at American University, pieces together the competing motivations that drove each leader’s response to the atrocities. Timely and incisive,
A Calculated Restraint sheds new light on the relationship between World War II and the Holocaust. Ultimately, the Allied leaders’ responses cannot be reduced to a matter of character. What they said—and chose not to say—about the Holocaust must be understood in light of the political and military exigencies that drove their decision-making.
Breitman will be in conversation about the book with Rick Salomon, a co-founder of the Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center, Senior Fellow at the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights, and a member of the Advisory Board of the Renew Democracy Initiative.
The Allied leaders rarely spoke directly about the Holocaust in public. When Churchill and Stalin alluded to Nazi mass murder of civilians in early speeches, they said much less than they knew. Not until December 1942 did Allied governments issue a joint statement about Nazi Germany’s policy of exterminating the Jews of Europe. Roosevelt deferred his own public statement until March 1944. Why didn’t these leaders speak up sooner?
Through close readings of public and private statements,
Richard Breitman, an acclaimed author and distinguished emeritus professor at American University, pieces together the competing motivations that drove each leader’s response to the atrocities. Timely and incisive,
A Calculated Restraint sheds new light on the relationship between World War II and the Holocaust. Ultimately, the Allied leaders’ responses cannot be reduced to a matter of character. What they said—and chose not to say—about the Holocaust must be understood in light of the political and military exigencies that drove their decision-making.
Breitman will be in conversation about the book with Rick Salomon, a co-founder of the Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center, Senior Fellow at the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights, and a member of the Advisory Board of the Renew Democracy Initiative.
Visitors have access to all exhibitions in the Museum at any time during opening hours. Click here to see all exhibitions on view.
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COVID-19 Safety Guidelines: Please review our Health and Safety page before planning your visit for more information on our visitation guidelines.
We provide free admission to Holocaust Survivors, active members of the military, first responders, and NYC DOE K-12 students. If this applies to you, please contact us at 646-437-4202 to schedule your visit.
We also accept the Sightseeing Pass and the Go City Pass, please bring your pass to the Museum for free admission.
Groups of 15 or more must book through the Group Tours page.
What Do I Do With All This Heritage? is the first-ever theatre show to explore the lives of Asian American Jews, a whimsical and thought-provoking journey into their lives as they reveal their true stories of holding two age-old traditions in their hearts.
What Do I Do With All This Heritage? is the first-ever theatre show to explore the lives of Asian American Jews, a whimsical and thought-provoking journey into their lives as they reveal their true stories of holding two age-old traditions in their hearts.
In Two Sisters, Rosie Whitehouse recounts the harrowing journey of her mother-in-law, Marion, and aunt, Huguette, who fled Nazi-occupied France after their mother was deported to Auschwitz. Seeking refuge, the sisters found themselves in Val d'Isère, where a courageous stranger, Dr. Frédéric Pétri, saved their lives. Whitehouse meticulously pieces together her family's tragic history while probing ethical questions about courage and complicity during the Holocaust. Through vivid storytelling, she highlights the risks taken by individuals like Dr. Pétri to protect Jewish lives amid the horrors of Vichy France and her contemporary quest to recognize Dr. Pétri as a Righteous Among Nations.
Two women in Nazi-occupied Paris created a daring escape line that rescued dozens of Allied servicemen. With one still in a German prison camp, the other wrote a book about it—a memoir built on fabrications. Now the bestselling author of Eighty Days shares their incredible, never-before-told full story.
Etta Shiber and Kate Bonnefous are the unlikeliest of heroines: two seemingly ordinary women, an American widow and an English divorcée, living quietly together in Paris. Yet during the Nazi occupation, these two friends find themselves unexpectedly plunged into the whirlwind of history. With the help of a French country priest and others, they set out to rescue British and French soldiers trapped behind enemy lines—some of whom they daringly smuggle through Nazi checkpoints hidden inside the trunk of their car.
Ultimately the Gestapo captures them both. After eighteen months in prison, Etta is returned to the United States in a prisoner exchange. Back home, hoping to bring attention to her friend Kitty’s bravery, she publishes a memoir about their work. Paris-Underground becomes a publishing sensation and Etta a celebrity. Meanwhile Kate spends the rest of the war in a Nazi prison, entirely unaware of the book that has been written about her—and the deeds that have been claimed in her name.
In researching this story, Matthew Goodman uncovered military records and personal testimonies that reveal, for the first time, the shocking truth behind Etta’s memoir and the unexpected, far-reaching consequences of its publication. More than just a story of two women’s remarkable courage, Paris Undercover is a vivid, gripping account of deceit, betrayal, and personal redemption.
Join the Museum of Jewish Heritage and singer-songwriter Alex Blue for a concert followed by an audience Q&A.
Alex Blue (she/her) is a Jewish-Mexican folk singer-songwriter from Aurora, CO. With a diverse range of influences spanning from Fleetwood Mac and Joni Mitchell to Shaun Colvin, Patty Griffin, and Gaby Moreno, Alex's music carries echoes of nostalgia intertwined with contemporary storytelling. Her unique blend of folk songwriting and pop-inspired melodies sets her songs apart. As a neurodivergent artist, she brings a unique perspective to her songwriting, exploring her inner world as a landscape of its own. Her most recent record, “Kin,” orbits themes of family, grief, diaspora, and queer motherhood.
Alex’s strengths as a songwriter—poetic lyricism, truthful storytelling, stirring melodies—are integrated into an artistry that is authentic and transfixing. She writes, performs, and produces music that is grounding, transparent, and connective; that doesn’t demand attention but invites listeners into an experience that is gentle and generous.
Discover a powerful, untold chapter of Holocaust history and a daughter's enduring quest to know the story that began a generation before her birth. From childhood, Julie Brill struggled to understand how her father survived as a young Jewish boy in Belgrade, where Nazis murdered 90 percent of the Jewish population without gas chambers or cattle cars. Through exacting research, a bit of luck, and three emotional trips to Serbia, she pieces together her family's lost past, unearths secrets, and returns to her father a small part of what the Nazis stole: his own family history.
Watching Walter is a short biopic (and feature film proof of concept) starring Stephen Tobolowsky set in both 1995 Philadelphia and World War II Nazi occupied Poland. Based on the true story of Holocaust survivor-turned watchmaker Wladyslaw "Walter" Wojnas, it's a slice of life story that touches on several poignant moments in his life during those times.
The screening will be followed by a talkback and audience Q&A with Mitch Yapko, Director/Producer, Mark Dylan Brown, Writer/Executive Producer, and Cynthia Gravinese, Executive Producer.