More than Child’s Play

This exhibition tells the story of Rosa Freudenthal (1870–1951) and the creative project she undertook in Weimar-era Germany. After World War I, with her children grown, Rosa looked for a way to fill her time and also supplement her income. She began to organize exhibition-sales of Jewish art in the living room of her apartment in Breslau (Wrocław). In 1921 she gave this undertaking a name: The Freudenthal Arts and Crafts Workshop, Breslau (Kunstgewerbestube Freudenthal, Breslau). She developed children’s games with Jewish content, as well as commissioning Jewish ritual objects with a modern design. After supervising both the design process and production, which were executed by individual artists or studios, she exhibited the objects and marketed them. These products were purchased and displayed not only in Breslau – which at the time had the third-largest Jewish community in Germany – but also throughout the country and even abroad.

When Rosa immigrated to Mandatory Palestine in 1934, the Freudenthal Workshop closed. But thanks to the family archive compiled by her granddaughter Aviva Schmelzinger, as well numerous mentions in the press of the time, we are able to get a vivid picture of the woman and her enterprise – and also to spotlight a singular episode of Jewish culture and education in interwar Germany.

After World War II, only a limited number of Workshop products remained, finding their way into a few museums and private collections. The objects that Rosa kept with her (mainly ones made for children) were passed down to her granddaughter, who gifted them to the Israel Museum. This rare collection is now displayed to the Israeli public for the first time.

Rosa Freudenthal, née Graetzer (1870–1954)
Haifa, 1938
Courtesy of Rivka Sklan and Sara Frenkel, Jerusalem

Scan: © The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, by Oleg Kalashnikov

Electric memorial lamp, 1932, and etrog (citron) box, ca. 1924
Brass sheet, hammered and chased
Collection of Rivka Sklan and Sara Frenkel, Jerusalem

Photo: © The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, by Zohar Shemesh

Matzah cover, ca. 1925
Designer unknown (Hilda Zadikow?)
Batik on cotton
Hebrew inscription: “This is the bread of affliction” (from the Passover Haggadah)
Collection of Rivka Sklan and Sara Frenkel, Jerusalem

Photo: © The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, by Zohar Shemesh

Alfred Graetzer (1875–1911)
Joachim, the Artist’s Son, ca. 1906
Lithograph

Photo: © The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, by Zohar Shemesh

The Proverbs of Solomon game, 1931
Design: Artur Schwarz 
Lithograph
Gift of Aviva Schmelzinger, Jerusalem

Photo: © The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, by Zohar Shemesh

Model sukkah, 1921
Design: Erna Selten, 1880–1942 Lithograph; cut-outs 
Gift of Aviva Schmelzinger, Jerusalem

Photo: © The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, by Zohar Shemesh