Jews/America/A Representation

For many years, French photographer Frederic Brenner has travelled the world, documenting the lives of Jews on five continents to create a visual anthology of the Jewish diaspora. This book chronicles the American portion of his odyssey, recording the extraodinary diversity of Jewish life in large cities and small communities in 32 states. He photographed the faces of ordinary people as well as the famous and accomplished, such as Isaac Stern, Steven Spielberg, Barbra Streisand, Walter Annenberg, Saul Bellow, Ruth Bader-Ginsberg and Estee Lauder. This mosaic of a widely-varied cultural experience incorporates the Psychoanalytic Society of New York City, Jewish Harley-Davidson enthusiasts in Miami Beach, the Hebrew Academy in Las Vegas, and a spiritual gathering of Navajos and Jews in Monument Valley. Introducing the photographs is an essay by a cultural historian, Simon Schama, who is English and thus brings another perspective to bear on the American Jewish experience.