Jews of Kurdistan exhibition

28th June 2012

Royal Geographical Society, London

I curated an exhibition of historical photography relating to the Jewish community of Kurdistan, taken in the 1940s by British photographer Anthony Kersting. The exhibition was one of a series of events organised by the charity Gulan to celebrate the religious minorities of Kurdistan.

The Jewish community of Kurdistan has its roots in Sargon II of Assyria’s capture of Samaria in 722 BC and deportation of its population to the banks of the Habur river. The newcomers adopted the Aramaic language of central Assyria but kept the Hebrew script, and there they remained, impoverished but largely content and well integrated, for some 2700 years until the mid-20th century politicisation of religion dispersed the community across the globe.

Anthony Kersting’s archive is held by the Courtauld Institute of Art, London.