Monday, September 15, 2008

New Jewish Museum in Moscow?

According to Ha'aretz, "the world's largest Jewish museum" is to be built in Moscow. Construction is to begin in 2009 and be completed by 2011...

The building apparently is already there, renovated last year and already serving as a museum (after an early history as a bus depot.)

According to the article, "The German architectural firm Graft Labs will be in charge of renovation and expansion, and international design company Ralph Appelbaum Associates will head design. The building, which spans 9,000 square meters, will be enlarged by adding underground floors covering 15,000 square meters, making it the largest Jewish museum in the world."

Having following the slow and complex process of creating a Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw over the past 10 years and more, It all sounds pretty quick -- I wonder who is curating the exhibitions, which are supposed to "commemorate Russian-Jewish history and include galleries of Jewish art and Judaica. Another section will commemorate the Holocaust. Plans include the construction of a large library, a center for Judaic studies and conference rooms."

Funding is coming from the Russian Cultural Foundation, the Moscow Jewish community and Jewish philanthropists headed by the incredibly weathly businessman Lev Leviev.

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