The digital exhibition “Navigating between Gravities” is an invitation to a multilayered journey along a continuum stretched across Jewish past and present, within three of Berlin’s most vibrant and heterogeneous boroughs – Kreuzberg, Friedrichshain and Neukölln. 

The exhibition, organized by Partnerschaft für Demokratie Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg and Partnerschaft für Demokratie Neukölln, allows the visitors to navigate between two charged and complex times and spaces: A historical map that reveals traces of the Jewish life that once flourished in these neighborhoods before the rise of the Nazi regime, overlaid by a map of the Jewish present – following the October 7 terror attack on Israel and the devastating war in Gaza that followed. This latter map, at the heart of the exhibition, gathers voices, perspectives, images, actions, stories, and gestures, created by Jewish artists, scholars, activists, and organizations living in the neighborhoods in response to these events.

Hamas’s acts of callous cruelty violated the existence of Jews in Israel and the diaspora, exposing Jewish fragility, rekindling fears passed down through generations. The ongoing and escalating conflict in the Middle East has affected the gravitation and certainties of Jewish life in Berlin, where a sense of danger from antisemitism and antisemitic violence has grown significantly in the past year. Tensions across lines of difference in the three boroughs, home to many ethnic communities with migrant backgrounds, have also shifted and intensified as a result of the political context.

Some of the works reveal a loss of sense of security, while others create a space for voicing trauma, loss and grief. Some strive to strengthen Jewish-Muslim interfaith dialogue and create new alliances, and others address the loss of sense of belonging among parts of the left. A few encourage us to react emphatically to the suffering of others, while others call for an end to the war. 

This exhibition therefore aims to serve as a civic space to navigate between complex conversations and reflections, attesting to the loss, trauma and pain on the one hand, and hope, dialogue and empathy on the other.
We would like to thank all of the exhibition participants for sharing their work, thoughts, and insights with us (in alphabetical order): Jeremy Borovitz, Guy David Briller, Fraenkelufer Synagogue, Marina Frenk, Hillel Deutschland, Noa Heyne, Hori Izhaki, Jewish Moving Pictures e.V, Olaf Kühnemann, Laba Berlin, Dekel Peretz, Ariel Reichman, Maja Sorjef and The Jewish Museum Berlin.
We would like to sincerely thank Maya Rotman, the exhibition’s web designer, and Einav Vaisman, who illustrated the neighborhood map, for their work, collaboration, and great efforts. 

Finally, we would like to extend our gratitude to Verband für Interkulturelle Arbeit (VIA) Regionalverband Berlin/Brandenburg e.V. and Nachbarschaftsheim Neukölln for their joint work and support. 

Sapir Huberman & Dr. Debby Farber, Exhibition’s curators