An Inquiring Mind: Erich Brauer, Ethnographer of the Eastern Jews

AN INQUIRING MIND:

ERICH BRAUER, ETHNOGRAPHER OF THE EASTERN JEWS

APRIL 12 – SEPTEMBER 1, 2024

Exhibition curator: Revital Hovav, The Isidore and Anne Falk Information Center for Jewish Art and Life

Designer: Eyal Rosen

 Jewish-German Zionist anthropologist Erich Brauer (1895–1942) was passionate about the study of the “living people,” that is, the daily life of Jewish communities. Brauer was a pioneer of ethnography in pre-State Israel in the 1920s and 1930s, his work focusing on Jerusalem’s ethnic groups, notably Jewish immigrants from Yemen and Kurdistan, and on their everyday objects of material culture. He dedicated most of his life to the realization of this goal. This exhibition presents a portrait of Brauer as a scholar who is now gaining renewed attention, displaying, for the first time, some of his prolific, yet unpublished output.

Brauer first arrived in Jerusalem in 1925, carrying two “suitcases.” The first was his physical suitcase, a manifestation of his identity as an immigrant traveling back and forth between Germany and the Land of Israel, his life marked by a sense of alienation and impermanence. The other “suitcase” was intellectual: the fruits of his education in German universities of the early 20th century which he sought to apply to the diverse population of Eastern Jews living in Jerusalem.

Brauer held a comprehensive view of the “Science of Man,” integrating the physical, social, and cultural aspects of human existence. He enlisted all of his many talents to promoting his research: as an ethnographer, he collected and documented objects with a skilled and professional eye; and as an artistic personality, he drew, painted, and photographed the objects of his study. This exhibition goes behind the scenes of Brauer’s work, exploring the instruments he employed in his research; his methodology of object collection; and the obstacles he encountered. It also sheds light on those who remain unmentioned in his books: the individuals who supplied him with information, the names and faces that constituted the “living people.” Brauer’s work is also considered within the larger context of his theories and methods – which reflect his studies in interwar Germany – and the response to such approaches in contemporary public discourse.

The exhibition was made possible by the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Foundation, Cleveland, Ohio; and the Beare Foundation, Durban, South Africa.

AN INQUIRING MIND: ERICH BRAUER, ETHNOGRAPHER

OF THE EASTERN JEWS

Hebrew/English catalogue

Made possible by the Joseph Alexander Foundation, New York