Welcome to the new Website of The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life!

Welcome to our new website!  

In conjunction with the transfer of the collections of the Judah L. Magnes Museum to the University of California, Berkeley, and the establishment of The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life at The Bancroft Library, we are launching a new web platform to represent our holdings, our programs, and our vision. 

The support of the Toole Media Fund enabled us to develop the site you are viewing right now in partnership with Outhink Media. In its technology, the site leverages the capability of the open source platform, drupal, to serve as a veritable “hub” between the collection database, curatorial work, and the content disseminated across the world wide web thanks to emerging social media and our own digital programs. In its content, this site is destined to become a dynamic archive of the history of the Magnes, from the beginnings of the Judah L. Magnes Museum, its founders and its community, to the excitement of academic life at UC Berkeley. 

In this site you can:

• Celebrate the legacy of the Judah L. Magnes Museum
• Learn about the work of The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life at UC Berkeley
• Remain updated on the development of the new Magnes facility in downtown Berkeley
• Discover the wonders of the Magnes collection, and interact with it
• Find research information and browse through the holdings of the Western Jewish Americana archives
• Stay in touch through all the new social media
• Read about our innovative curatorial practices

As you can read in our news, we are in flux: our collections recently moved to the University of California, Berkeley, and we are developing a new facility, located in downtown Berkeley, which will open in the Fall of 2011. Our staff is currently hosted by The Bancroft Library, and our collections are stored and are being processed for a full integration with the libraries and museums at UC Berkeley.

This website represents and reflects the many exciting changes, challenges and opportunities involved in the creation of The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life. Not all content in the various areas of the site has yet been created, and some functionalities are not yet fully implemented. There are ways in which all visitors to the site can contribute to it: do not hesitate to contact us and to follow us. 

We hope that you will enjoy seeing, reading and listening to us and to our collections, and that you will return to this site to see it grow each day.

Thank you,

The Magnes