24 January 2022: Keynote; Jews and Judaism in Rembrandt’s Own World
31 January 2022: Spiritual Values that United and Divided Rembrandt and the Jews
7 February 2022: Jews in the Art World and Rembrandt
14 February 2022: Rembrandt in Russia
All sessions will begin at 20:00 Moscow time, which is 19:00 in Israel, 18:00 in continental Western Europe, 17:00 in the United Kingdom, 12:00 on the North American east coast, and 09:00 on the west coast
From 19 October 2022 through 15 January 2023 the Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center in Moscow is presenting an exhibition on the meaning of Rembrandt to Jews. With the Jews in his city of Amsterdam Rembrandt had contact of various professional and personal kinds, which will be evoked in a reconstruction of his neighborhood. He painted and etched portraits of Jewish sitters, used Jews as models for face studies and put Jewish figures into genre scenes and Bible compositions. Jews in Amsterdam and elsewhere soon began to see Rembrandt in a different light than other artists. His portrait etchings became models for images of rabbis. Female figures by him began to be called Jewish brides.
In the nineteenth century there was an intensification of the perceived link between Rembrandt and the Jews. He was seen as sympathetic toward the Jews, in a time when this was far from common. To European Jews, including wealthy art collectors, this made him the object of special admiration; to anti-Semites it brought him a measure of disdain. Responding to both these effects, Rembrandt was embraced by generation after generation of Jewish artists, who identified with him in their art and in their lives.
These themes and more will be explored and displayed in the exhibition, whose guest curators are Gary Schwartz and Mirjam Knotter. In preparation for it, the Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center has organized a series of lectures on the subject of the exhibition. They will be presented online in four sessions of three half-hour lectures each, on successive Mondays starting on 24 January 2022.
Moderator for all sessions: Gary Schwartz
For the program, and to register, please click here.
