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Guide to the Ira Nowinski collection, ca. 1965-2000
Mss Photo 440
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Title: Ira Nowinski collection,
Date (inclusive): ca. 1965-2000
Collection number: Mss Photo 440
Creator:
Nowinski, Ira
Extent:
10 linear ft.
(ca. 15,000 photographs and negatives)
Repository:
Stanford University. Libraries. Dept. of Special Collections and University Archives.
Abstract: The collection consists of two major subdivisions. The first is negatives and prints from Nowinski's Holocaust collection
totalling some 6,250 images and 1,548 prints, and includes the following projects: "In fitting memory; the art and politics
of Holocaust memorials," the Segal Holocaust Memorial, the 50th anniversary Warsaw ghetto uprising, and the opening of the
U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. The second subdivision is Judaica photographs, totalling some 8,905 images. This segment includes
three projects: the Karaite Jews, Israel, and the Soviet Jews of San Francisco.
Language:
English.
There are no restrictions on access.
Property rights reside with the repository. Literary rights
reside with the creators of the documents or their heirs. To
obtain permission to publish or reproduce, please contact the
Public Services Librarian of the Dept. of Special Collections.
Ira Nowinski collection. Mss Photo 440. Dept. of Special Collections, Stanford University Libraries, Stanford, Calif.
Purchased, 2001.
Ira Nowinski is an American photographer of Polish and Hungarian Jewish descent. Born ca. 1942 and raised in New York, he
was the first person in his family born in the United States. At the age of 42, he was prodded by opera singer Regina Resnick
to do a photo essay around the Jewish milieu. He had previously done photo essays of the North Beach, San Francisco, area,
of the evacuation of elderly citizens from hotels in the South of Market area of San Francisco, and of the Southeast Asian
Community in the same city. In addition, he had been the staff photographer of the San Francisco Opera since 1978.
Working first with Resnick and then with Seymour Fromer of the Judah L. Magnes Museum, Rhonda Abrams of the Anti-Defamation
League, Anita Friedman of Jewish Family & Children's Services, and the Northern California Board of Rabbis, Nowinski began
documenting the Jewish experience in the San Francisco Bay Area. One of his first projects was to document Soviet Jews who
had immigrated during the 1970's and 1980's.
He also photographed the Karaite Jewish Community in Foster City. The Karaites were a Jewish community that had lived for
nearly 500 years in Egypt. The Arab-Israeli war resulted in the expulsion of the Jews from Egypt at the conclusion of that
conflict. Many subsequently immigrated first to Israel and then to Northern California. Nowinski retraced their migration
route in reverse, first photographing Karaites in Foster City, California, then in Israel, and finally in Egypt.
Nowinski and Sybil Milton of the U.S. Holocaust Museum did a joint work on the Holocaust Memorials throughout Europe, Israel,
and in the United States. This work, entitled "In fitting memory : the art and politics of Holocaust memorials" combined text
provided by Milton with Nowinski's photographic essay of the monuments documenting the millions of Jews who lost their lives
under the Nazi regime.
Collection Scope and Content Summary
The collection consists of two major subdivisions. The first is negatives and prints from Nowinski's Holocaust collection
totalling some 6,250 images and 1,548 prints, and includes the following projects: "In fitting memory; the art and politics
of Holocaust memorials," the Segal Holocaust Memorial, the 50th anniversary Warsaw ghetto uprising, and the opening of the
U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. The second subdivision is Judaica photographs, totalling some 8,905 images. This segment includes
three projects: the Karaite Jews, Israel, and the Soviet Jews of San Francisco.
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.
Segal, George, 1924-
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) in art.
Jews, Russian--California--San Francisco.
Karaites--California--Foster City.
Karaites--Egypt--Cairo--Religious life and customs.
Karaites--Israel--Religious life and customs.
Warsaw (Poland)--History--Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, 1943.
Photoprints.
Jewish photographers.
Photographers--United States.
Jewish studies.
Segal Holocaust Memorial.
Warsaw Ghetto Memorial (Warsaw, Poland)
In fitting memory; the art of politics of Holocaust memorials.