LIMMUD FSU Recharge Presenters 2022
What is Limmud? What are the Principles? Also, learn some of our History and more.
Zion Ozeri Israeli-American photographer known for his photographs documenting Jewish experience and the Jewish Diaspora
Born in Israel to Immigrants from Yemen and currently living in New York City, Zion Ozeri is one of the world’s leading photographers exploring the Jewish experience. Raised in Israel during a period of mass immigration, he interacted with many diverse cultures. This unique background gives him a cross-culture perspective that suffuses his work. He graduated from the Fashion Institute of Technology and Pratt Institute, both in New York City. His photographs have appeared in many national publications and exhibited in museums and galleries around the world. Ozeri published a few books including, Pictures Tell: A Passover Haggadah, (Gefen Publishing House, 2022) as well as a coffee table book, The Jews of Yemen, The Last Generation, (Keter, Jerusalem, 2005). Ozeri won a Simon Rockower Award for Excellence in Jewish Journalism in 2004 and is the recipient of the Covenant award for 2013. He founded The Jewish Lens curriculum & project in 2004, now being offered through ANU, the museum of the Jewish People, in Tel Aviv. In addition, Ozeri founded, and is the creative director of Within the Image, an Early Childhood project, as well as “DiverCity Lens”, a curriculum and program, implemented since 2010, in NYC public schools, through NYC Department of Education.
Sessions
Journey to the End of an Empire
In October 1991, as the Soviet Union was collapsing – evaporating from the global landscape – photographer Zion Ozeri and writer Yossi Klein Halevi went on a month-long journey through the wreckage of a failed empire in search of their Jewish brothers and sisters.
That moment marked the end of the Cold War and the sudden, unexpected collapse of the most powerful totalitarian empire in history. The exodus of Soviet Jewry was at its height; within the next few years, some two million Jews would leave and resettle, mostly in Israel, but also in the U.S. and Germany.
This presentation chronicles that extraordinary moment in modern Jewish history – as well as the period leading up to it and its aftermath. In a series of photographic portraits, “Journey to the End of an Empire” captures the liberation of Soviet Jews and the triumph of the Soviet Jewry movement – a cause that had riveted world Jewry for over two decades and became the greatest Diaspora victory of our time. Through this particular lens, we shed light on an historic event that changed the world and remains of profound significance for humanity.