Yiddish Book Center to Reopen to the Public on June 24, 2021

The Yiddish Book Center has announced it will begin its phased reopening on Thursday, June 24, 2021. The Center will be open to the public on Thursdays, Fridays, Sundays, and Mondays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.  

The Center is home to the world’s first Yiddish museum. The distinctive building is designed to recall a shtetl—the iconic Jewish town of Eastern Europe—and is set on a ten-acre apple orchard at the edge of the campus of Hampshire College adjacent to the Eric Carle Museum in Amherst, Massachusetts. 

“We’re so looking forward to welcoming visitors back to the Center,” says Lisa Newman, director of publishing and public programs. “Our Yiddish Writers Garden is in full bloom, our permanent exhibits are in place, and we’ve just installed a dynamic new visiting exhibit that spans two galleries.”

The visiting exhibit by NYC-based, multimedia artist Steve Marcus comprises two connected exhibits. Through the Hat includes wood-carved objects that seamlessly weave together Marcus’ childhood memories of bagels and bialys, pickles and green tomatoes from the barrel, and paper-wrapped whitefish chubs with his personal journey and passion for his own roots and culture. The Golden Medina expands on this series, welcoming the viewer deeper into Marcus’ world of contemporary kosher folk art through humorous depictions of everyday Jewish life that communicate wisdom from Yiddish proverbs. The exhibit will be on view at the Center through fall 2021.

Since closing its doors to the public on March 12, 2020, due to the pandemic, the Yiddish Book Center has been and will continue to offer an ongoing series of free virtual public programs. Its annual YIDSTOCK: The Festival of New Yiddish Music will be presented as a 75-minute, pre-recorded, virtual program on July 11, 2021. The Center’s English-language Museum Store, which can be accessed online through its website, will also be open for in-person shoppers beginning June 24.

To ensure the health and safety of its visitors and staff, the Center has new visitor protocols in place. Visitors must follow the most current Massachusetts travel guidelines. All visitors will be required to wear facemasks while in the Center and to adhere to social distancing requirements to protect the safety of themselves and others.

A self-guided audio tour will be available to all visitors.

Suggested donation: $8 for adults; $6 for seniors. Free for members, students, and children. 

For information and to view the events calendar visit yiddishbookcenter.org.

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About the Yiddish Book Center

The Yiddish Book Center is a nonprofit organization working to recover, celebrate, and regenerate Yiddish and modern Jewish literature and culture.

The million Yiddish books recovered by the Yiddish Book Center represent Jews’ first sustained literary and cultural encounter with the modern world. They are a window onto the past thousand years of Jewish history, a precursor of modern Jewish writing in English, Hebrew, and other languages, and a springboard for new creativity. Since its founding in 1980, the Center has launched a wide range of bibliographic, educational, and cultural programs to share these treasures with the wider world. 

PRESS: For more information contact the Yiddish Book Center’s Director of Communications and Marketing Jenn Einhorn at [email protected] or 413.256.4900 x118.