The Dreaming Youth of LubomI

From the familiar babushka to the women of the fire brigade, the photographs in “Remembering LubomI: Images of a Jewish Community” recall one Polish community that spanned the spectrum of tradition and assimilation.

Only 51 of the 4,000 Jews who lived in LubomI, Poland, at the time of the Holocaust survived. But Aaron Ziegelman, who fled the country in 1938, was determined to show the world the diversity of Jewish life in his hometown and three years ago undertook the LubomI Exhibition Project to rescue the photos and artifacts of LubomI, known by its Jews as Libivne.

“Libivne and its youth—a dreaming youth, a thinking youth—some of whom had faith in the Messiah the son of David, and some who had faith in Marxand Engels; others yet in Herzl and are turn to Zion,” recalls one Libivner woman, Chane Kroyt Achtman, in wall text about the city’s Jewish past.

The exhibit is on display at the Yeshiva University’s Benjamin N.Cardozo School of Law, in New York City, through Jan. 26. To bring “Remembering LubomI: Images of a Jewish Community” to your community, contact project director Jill Vexler at the LubomI Exhibition Project, 212-807-7241.