Berlin – Remnants of an anti-Semitic past are reappearing in Berlin: Viennese walking sticks with handles depicting long Jewish noses, for example, and 19th-century, Shylock-type porcelain figures conspiring to get rich on the stock exchange.
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Fortunately, only for a limited time, and more fortunately, at the Jewish Museum, the only place in Germany which can put on a show addressing stereotypes about Jews without risking offense.
The Jewish Museum’s show, called “Typical! Cliches About Jews and Others,” opened March 20. The pamphlet asks: “Are blacks better athletes? Are pipe-smokers companionable, and do Jews have long noses?”
The only one of those questions tackled in detail is the last. There are the walking sticks, a Nazi book showing a school class learning how to identify Jews and a work by Dennis Kardon entitled “49 Jewish Noses,” labeled with names of their owners.
The show, aimed at challenging prejudice. [bloomberg]