Ever walk past a unique building in Milwaukee and wonder what’s inside? That’s the idea behind the 13th annual Doors Open taking place throughout the city this year. Take self-guided tours of buildings, homes and monuments across Milwaukee, many of which are not normally open to the public. Visit doorsopenmilwaukee.org to plan your weekend.
Explore the history of Jewish Milwaukee for FREE!
Jewish Museum Milwaukee is open for Doors Open on Sunday, September 29, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Highlights of the Jewish Museum Milwaukee’s permanent exhibit include stories of Jewish immigration into Milwaukee, Golda Meir’s childhood within the city and her return during a world tour in 1969, the Settlement Cookbook and the ‘her-story’ of Lizzie Black Kander, and the wall-sized tapestry created by renowned artist Marc Chagall called “The Prophet Jeremiah,” which was made especially for this building.
PERMANENT & SPECIAL EXHIBITS ARE FREE
View the newest special exhibit Against the Grain: The Remarkable Life of Artist Bernard Perlin. Bernard Perlin was a minority, outsider, gay man, and pursuer of truth, beauty, and justice. This exhibit celebrates and brings deserved visibility to an individual who lived passionately and unapologetically against the grain. Born to Russian Jewish immigrants in 1918, artist-activist Perlin was a talented painter, illustrator, war artist-correspondent, and photographer, who tackled stylistic genres, the horrors of WWII, issues of social justice, and homosexuality with conviction and bravery.
THE BUILDING & HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL SCULPTURE
Jewish Museum Milwaukee is housed within the Edward Durell Stone-designed Helfaer Community Service Building, a simple, balanced, cream-colored brick building constructed 50 years ago in 1973. The Museum was developed in 2008 after a renovation by Kahler-Slater. The building also houses the Milwaukee Jewish Federation, the Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle, the Holocaust Education Resource Center, and many more Jewish organizations. The second and third floors of the Helfaer Community Service Building are not accessible during Doors Open.
To the north of the building, visitors will see a memorial to the Holocaust designed by Milwaukee-born artist, Claire Lieberman. The corten steel sheets give a book-like effect, symbolic of the Jewish identity as “people of the book.”