The Leo Baeck Institutes in London and Jerusalem have launched an exhibition and an accompanying social media campaign called “Library of Lost Books,” which calls on the public to help search for stolen Nazi property and to collectively map the books found on a dynamic map.
The map is embedded in a digital exhibition that tells the story of the books and their readers. Decentralized physical installations present the books themselves in the places of their exile.
Using the example of the Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums in Berlin (1872–1942) and its library, the remains of which are now scattered all over the world, we want to test new formats of historical education in this project.
The exhibition “Library of Lost Books” has been on display in Berlin, London, Prague, Jerusalem and Los Angeles over the course of 2024.
It invites its audience to actively engage with one of the most important institutions of liberal Judaism in pre-war Germany.
