Polin: From a “Here You Shall Rest” Covenant to the Creation of a Polish Jewish History Museum. An interview with Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett

Abstract

Abstract This article consists of an interview with Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, chief curator of the core exhibition of the newly opened POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw. Among other subjects, the conversation touches on the philosophy underlying the creation of the museum and the way it presents its subject as well as ways in which POLIN differs from others museums of Jewish and Polish history. Its location in Warsaw, both a leading historic center of Jewish civilization and a site of Jewish martyrdom, is stressed. The museum is described as “a kind of act of recovery,” and the hope is expressed that it will strengthen the recent revival of Jewish life and culture in democratic Poland.