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Where History Has A Voice The Sydney Jewish Museum is a living museum, where history is kept alive and dynamic to continue to speak to future generations in a way that will always resonate. Find out more -
New book I Met a Survivor This book of photographs by award-winning photographer Nadine Saacks captures intimate moments shared between Holocaust survivors and children too young to understand or grapple with the Holocaust.
The book is available for purchase in the Museum shop and on our website. Find out more -
Permanent exhibition Holocaust and Human Rights This exhibition traces the history of human rights and focuses on major human rights issues in Australia. Using digital technologies and interactive spaces, this exhibition invites visitors to challenge their perceptions and reflect on topics that may prove irresolvable. Find out more -
Feature exhibition Jukebox Jewkbox! To celebrate the history of music in Jewish life – and Jewish life in music – the Sydney Jewish Museum is presenting a new exhibition called Jukebox Jewkbox! A Century on Shellac and Vinyl.
See the iconic record covers and listen to songs by chart toppers like Bob Dylan, Barbra Streisand, Blondie, Leonard Cohen, Carole King and Amy Winehouse.
Exhibition now open. Find out more -
Permanent exhibition The Holocaust Located over three levels, this exhibition traces the persecution and murder of European Jews from 1933 to 1945.
The exhibition also recounts the new lives forged by Holocaust survivors following their arrival in Australia and their contribution to the rich, multicultural fabric of contemporary Australian life. Find out more
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Exhibitions
Feature exhibition
Jukebox Jewkbox! A Century on Shellac and Vinyl
To celebrate the history of music in Jewish life – and Jewish life in music – the Sydney Jewish Museum is presenting ‘Jukebox Jewkbox! A Century on Shellac and Vinyl’.
Visitors will be taken on a journey of the senses through tunes from cantorial to punk genres, and walls of hundreds of vibrant record covers, to unfold a surprising history of a universal language.
Permanent exhibition
The Holocaust
The Museum’s showcase permanent exhibition that traces the history of the Holocaust.
The exhibition features documents, photographs, original artefacts, film, maps, interactives, and audio and video testimony to guide the narrative. Many of the artefacts were donated by the community of Holocaust survivors that migrated to Australia.
Upcoming Events
Events Lunchtime Lecture – Preserving the Memory of the Holocaust for Future Generations
Wednesday 11 December 1.15pm
Free
Filmmaker Peter Hegedus will talk about his own family history and his recently produced films to illustrate how he has attempted to find new ways to engage the younger generation on the topic of the Holocaust.
See Full Calendar
Where History Has A Voice
The Sydney Jewish Museum’s tagline, “Where history has a voice”, distills the origins of the Museum and its mission that continues to transmit across generations.
The objects within the collection and on display in the Museum’s exhibitions tell compelling stories of their owners and contribute to the narratives that the Museum tells within its walls. Testimony, accessible digitally and face-to-face, anchors the objects in the display cases to real world events, and gives life and narrative to history.
The Sydney Jewish Museum is a living museum, where history is kept alive and dynamic to continue to speak to future generations in a way that will always resonate.
Read MoreBecome a Museum Guide
Become a guide
The Sydney Jewish Museum is seeking new, committed volunteer guides with a passion for history and education to complete the training course and share their knowledge with groups of students and adults in the Museum’s exhibitions.
Guides are the transmitters of stories. They take small groups through the Museum and share their knowledge and stories in line with the Museum’s education philosophy.
Our next guide training course will run from 13 February 2020 to 14 September 2020.
Bar and Bat Mitzvah Program
More Information
A Bar and Bat Mitzvah is an incredibly special time for families to share – a significant milestone and a rite of passage.
This new program introduces children preparing for their Bar or Bat Mitzvah, together with their parents, to moving stories of what this rite of passage means to Holocaust survivors.
Together, in a three-hour session on a Sunday afternoon at the Museum, families will hear about how some survivors practiced their Judaism in hiding during the Holocaust, and how others celebrated this significant event decades after the war.
Be A Voice
Become a member
BE A VOICE for inclusion, tolerance, respect, empathy and human dignity.
Through the support of Museum Members, the Sydney Jewish Museum is able to open more minds and hearts to the realities of the stories from the Holocaust, and the lessons this history can teach today about how to be better people in a caring world.
Our Members help us ensure our exhibitions, education programs and cultural events continue to inspire the thousands of student and adult visitors that pass through the Museum’s door each year.
Through their generosity, our Members are voices for inclusion, human dignity, respect and tolerance.
I Met a Survivor photographic book
The generation of Holocaust survivors is dwindling and when today’s young children are old enough to have a conversation about the Holocaust, they may not be able to actually meet a survivor and hear their testimony.
Introducing the Holocaust to young children can be difficult, but the photos in this powerful photographic book, one day, can be a way to start that conversation.
These photographs, taken by photographer Nadine Saacks, are published in a 145 page soft-cover book.
To purchase a copy of 'I Met a Survivor', follow the link below.
Shop Now Discover more
SJM blog
From Kristallnacht to King Street
November 4, 2019
From Kristallnacht to King Street On 9 November 1938, Nazi party members engaged in a program of bloody pogroms across Germany and Austria that became known as Kristallnacht (Night of …
Learn the History – Who is a Jew?
November 4, 2019
Learn the History – Who is a Jew? In order to understand the complex answer to the question ‘Who is a Jew?’, one has to look at the many sources …
Survivor Portraits – George Sternfeld
November 1, 2019
George Sternfeld was born in 1939 in Warsaw, Poland, and fled with his family to Siberia in 1940.
Browse our Education Programs online
We have a new Education Programs online portal, where teachers can browse our wide range of innovative programs for primary and secondary students.
All education programs are linked to NSW Education Standards Authority syllabus outcomes.
Search our programs by year level and subject to choose the perfect program to suit your students.
Visit Education Programs pageTeacher training
NESA-approved events bringing teachers together
The Sydney Jewish Museum offers regular professional development seminars for teachers, and the opportunity to engage with other teachers at our Teachers' Network events, which are held four times a year at the Museum.
Teachers' Facebook group
Join our Facebook group just for teachers
Connect with fellow teachers and Museum educators to build a conversation about teaching history and the Holocaust in the classroom.
Join our new SJM Learning group on Facebook to continue to conversation online.
Bring success through empathy
Workplaces that champion empathy are reported to outperform those that do not by 20%, according to the Harvard Business Review.
Yet 92% of people believe that companies seriously undervalue empathy.
Through encounters with Holocaust survivors, a Museum tour and a session with a psychologist, the Sydney Jewish Museum trains professionals in diverse fields to introduce new ways of approaching empathy within the workplace.
Learn more about how the Sydney Jewish Museum teaches empathy to create more emotionally intelligent and successful employees.
Learn About Empathy Training
The making of our Holocaust and Human Rights exhibition
Our new human rights exhibition, ‘The Holocaust and Human Rights’, was developed to provoke engagement with contemporary human rights issues in Australia against the backdrop of the Museum’s Holocaust exhibition. This extension of our Holocaust content aimed to bring the Museum into the national and global conversation about human rights.
The exhibition takes as its starting point the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, which was deemed necessary following the criminal acts of genocide perpetrated against civilians by the Nazis in the 1940s. The exhibition brings this content into a contemporary context to encourage visitors to connect with current issues and learn about all facets of the human rights violations, successes and debates.
The exhibition was researched and developed by a team of academics, educators, curators and designers over three years, with the assistance and support from a grant from the Australian Research Council. The 'Holocaust and Human Rights' was officially opened by Australian Human Rights Commissioner Edward Santow in February 2018
Exhibition details
What’s On Newsletter
Keep up to date on all Museum events and exhibitions.