Romania -- My Travel Piece in NYTimes online explore painted monasteries and Jewish cemeteries

The International Herald Tribune and NYTimes online runs my travel piece on the Bucovina region of northern Romania -- in which I write about both the painted monasteries and the Jewish cemeteries. The headline writer and photo caption writer unaccounably attributed everything to Gura Humorului, but that is just one of the places I mention in the story -- chosen as the dateline as it is the hub for two monasteries (Voronet and Humor) as well as the historic Jewish cemetery -- I posted a video of the cemetery in September.

November 7, 2009
Where Art and Faith Embrace in Gura Humorului, Romania
 
By RUTH ELLEN GRUBER

GURA HUMORULUI, ROMANIA — The Bucovina region in the far north of the country, wrote the Romanian scholar Silviu Sanie, is “one of those blessed realms where sacred and secular monuments have enriched the enchanting natural landscape. [...]”

Here are Romania’s famous painted monasteries, built in the 15th and 16th centuries when the region, a stronghold of Orthodox Christianity, was threatened by Ottoman invaders.
The vividly colored frescoes on their exterior walls, masterpieces of Byzantine painting, tell the tales of saints and heroes, and portray in epic imagery the cataclysmic struggle between good and evil at the end of days. [...]



Here, too, however, are religious sites far less known and rarely visited that also form important components of the region’s deeply rooted spiritual patrimony. These are the centuries-old Jewish cemeteries, whose weathered tombstones bear extraordinary carvings that meld folk motifs and religious iconography into evocative examples of faith expressed through art.

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Romania -- More on Gura Humorului

Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

By Ruth Ellen Gruber

A few weeks ago, I posted a video that I took of the wonderful and well maintained Jewish cemetery in Gura Humorului, Romania. I was there to document that tombstones of women for my project (Candle)sticks on Stone: Representing the Woman in Jewish Tombstone Art.

I forgot to include the link to the excellent and informative web site about Gura Humorului, which include a map and index of the cemetery. You can find that web site by clicking RIGHT HERE.

In 1857 Gura Humorului had a Jewish population of 190 souls. In that year also the Jewish cemetery was established. That cemetery was active until 1920. In 1920 the "New" cemetery was established right near the "Old" one, and it is still open today. This cemetery (the old and the new) has about 2060 graves. Stones beautifully cared for, many in German. The new part was renovated recently by The Association of Gura - Humora Jewish Community Descendants.

Romania -- Jewish cemetery in Gura Humorului

By Ruth Ellen Gruber

I've begun to post some YouTube videos of Jewish cemeteries in northern Romania that I am documenting for my (Candle)sticks on Stone project, which examines the way that women are represented in Jewish tombstone art.

The first video is of the cemetery in Gura Humorului, a little town in the heart of the painted monastery country -- two wonderful medieval monasteries, Humor and Voronets, are nearby. To me, the beautiful Jewish tombstones are in perfect harmony with the wonderful paintings on the monastery walls: touriststs visit the monasteries, however, and few people set foot in the cemetery.