‘L’dor v’dor’: Jewish women’s exhibit opened at Longue Vue

A new exhibit highlighting the accomplishments of generations of New Orleans women opened on February 1 with an early evening reception at Longue Vue House and Gardens, # 7 Bamboo Road. The exhibit is titled “l’dor v’dor: From Generation to Generation: Jewish Women and Their Impact on New Orleans” and is intended to showcase the influence of Jewish women as part of the tricentennial period being celebrated this year.

Phyllis Sugarman Dennery and Gladys Cahn examine minutes from the National Council of Jewish Women (circa 1933). (Photo via Longue Vue House and Gardens)

The exhibit is part of a community-wide effort to speak to the importance and influence of more than two dozen women, many of whom were leaders and organizers of Jewish organizations like the National Council of Jewish Women (NCJW) and others who worked behind the scenes as mentors to others in the visual arts or in the area of public justice. Its focus in from the years 1895 to 2005.

Longue Vue House and Gardens benefactress Edith Rosenwald Stern is among many of the women who are singled out. The pastel colors for the walls of the exhibit were based upon “Snake Lady,” a vibrant 1975 acrylic painting of Luba Glade by Peter Dean. Glade was a major influence on fellow gallery owners like Arthur Roger and Joshua Pailet and her own eponymous gallery in the Vieux Carré is listed as especially noteworthy.

National leaders from New Orleans like Gladys Cahn and Edna Weis Friend, both NCJW national presidents, are pictured along with more recent community leaders like Sara Stone, Flo Schorenstein and Joan Berenson.

Margi Bissinger in her guise as the story telling elf from “Let’s Tell a Story” over WDSU-TV. (Photo via Longue Vue House and Gardens)

Early documents from the Touro Infirmary Ladies Auxillary and the Jewish Children’s Home are also on display.

Political leaders like Tulane University’s Florence Schorenstein Andre and politicians such as now-retired Judge Miriam Waltzer are among those whose influence is listed in the exhibit.

A photo of three of the past and present Jewish Family Service executive directors – Julanne Issacson, Deena Gerber and Roselle Middleberg Ungar – is also prominently on display. 

Poetess Maxine Kaplan Cassin and potter Joanne Greenberg are among the artists represented in the exhibit.  Three of Cassin’s love poems to New Orleans and a photo of three examples of Greenberg’s highly collectible pieces of pottery are both mounted on the walls.

The exhibit is sponsored in part with support from the Jewish Endowment Foundation of Louisiana, Newcomb College Institute of Tulane University, the Greater New Orleans Section of the NCJW and NOLA4Women, a group whose focus in on promoting the accomplishments of local women. The exhibit will run from now until April 29. For more information go to their website or call 504-488-5488.