Team Discovers Pre-War Mezuzah Scroll.
Warsaw-based Judaica designers Helena Czernek and Aleksander Prugar, co-founders of "Mi Polin," create beautiful Judaica and engage in many interactive art projects. They have become best known for their mezuzah project, in which they travel to different towns across Poland, locate and make casts of pre-war mezuzah traces, and turn the casts themselves into mezuzot for Jews in Poland and around the world. Czernek says the goal is to give the old mezuzot new life.
While the duo are determined to find any mezuzot traces, they are most excited when they can find a klaf, or scroll within the mezuzah. They were rewarded in early January, when they discovered a 70-year old scroll in excellent condition in the Polish town of Przemysl, two hours south of Warsaw.
The Polish cardinal Stanisław Dziwisz recently received the mezuzah which Mi Polin designed for JCC Krakow from JCC Director Jonathan Ornstein. The cardinal visited the JCC for the Day of Judaism. The Jewish Community in Warsaw also gave Mi Polin's Menokiah to Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski for Chanukah in 2014.
"The parchment seems to be perfectly preserved," said Czernek. "It has been taken care of by experts on the preservation of monuments of history from the National Museum in Warsaw. We will decide together what to do with that precious piece of Jewish ceremonial art."
Mi Polin's project coincides with a national initiative to identify homes whose former Jewish owners perished in the Holocaust. This particular homeowner, noticing the diagonally placed metal on the doorframe, and knowing of Mi Polin's project, immediately contacted Czernek and Prugar.
Mi Polin's mezuzot and other art will be on display for the second time in the Bay Area (the first time was in September at the Osher Marin JCC) at the Peninsula JCC, April 1-June 25. In partnership with Lerhaus Judaica and with support from Taube Philanthropies, Czernek and Prugar will speak at the April 13 opening, with an introduction by Shana Penn, Executive Director of Taube Philanthropies. Mi Polin Judaica can be purchased at the PJCC during the exhibit and regularly at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco.
For more information contact: info@taubephilanthropies.org
