A controversial Berlin artist is the focal point of a new display at an Austrian Jewish museum entitled ‘Jewish Kitsch and Other Secret Obsessions’

The exhibition, being shown at the Jewish Museum in Hohenems, Austria, features the creative work of German artist Anna Adam.

Her project, called Adam’s Delicatessen, makes up the bulk of the show, which is being promoted with the motto ‘Identity shopping, God in detail and nostalgia for the objects of happiness.’

Adam has said she is primarily concerned with combating cliches that are associated with Jews using wit and sarcasm in her approach to audiences.

She told EJP that her project: “takes all your senses. You can see it, you can smell it, you can touch it, you can hear it, and you can taste it.”
Much of Adam’s installation is devoted to pseudo Jewish foods – such as Italian Style Gefillte Fish. “Unlike the [German] Carp [fish] original, in which bones lodge in the throat, the Italian recipe is made with Sardines and vegetables.” Gefillte Fish is not an Italian food at all. “The Italian version”, so Adam, “is certainly not a Jewish.”

Controversial Project

Adam, who is German by birth, belongs to the Jewish artists’ association Meshulash, located in Berlin

Her Delicatessen project catapulted her to fame in 2002 when it first appeared in the Jewish Museum of Franconia in Furth, Bavaria.

Jewish community leaders accused the museum in Furth of promoting rabble rousing against Jews “through Adam’s unconventional and disrespectful portrayal of Jewish rituals and religion”.

Jewish leaders believed that Adam’s style “perpetuated prejudices”, according to the HaGalil website.

“What makes the protest ludicrous is that the protestors never visited the exhibit”, Adam said.

Pseudo Judaism

Adam devotes much of her time to presenting items that are labeled “Jewish” when in fact, “they are not Jewish at all”. She makes continual reference to the phenomena of non-Jews developing a “pseudo-Jewish” lifestyle in a Europe relatively void of Jews.

What irritates her most is the fact that “Jews have begun to accept this fake Jewishness, as if it were real”, Adam said. Adams calls this fake realism “Jewish Disneyland”, referring to pseudo Kosher restaurants that dot former Jewish neighborhoods in central and eastern Europe, as well as Jewish products such as menorahs

An example of this is Berlin’s Oranienburg Street, the center-point of Berlin’s pre-war community of 250,000 Jews, which is today dotted by restaurants with Jewish sounding names. In fact, none of the restaurants in the neighborhood are Kosher.

“The public seems to only accept Jewish humor if it comes in the form of pseudo-Chassidic and anti-Semitic cliches,” she said.

One feature of Adam’s Delicatessen is her bonus point system. For each item bought, points get collected. “10,000 bonus points are enough to win a weekend on a wellness farm of the Queen of Sheba.”

The exhibit runs until October 8, 2005 at the Jewish Museum Hohenems, Austria.
www.jm-Hohenems.at