The Reuben and Edith Hecht Museum is a museum located on the grounds of the
University of Haifa
The University of Haifa ( he, אוניברסיטת חיפה Arabic: جامعة حيفا) is a university located on Mount Carmel in Haifa, Israel. Founded in 1963, the University of Haifa received full academic accreditation in 1972, becoming ...
,
Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
.
History
The Hecht Museum was established in 1984 by
Reuben Hecht,
director of
Dagon Silos and a founding member of the University of Haifa Board of Governors. For sixty years, Hecht collected archaeological
artefacts representing the
material culture of the
Land of Israel in
ancient times
Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history to as far as late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient history cov ...
. He was particularly interested in finds from the
Canaan
Canaan (; Phoenician: 𐤊𐤍𐤏𐤍 – ; he, כְּנַעַן – , in pausa – ; grc-bib, Χανααν – ;The current scholarly edition of the Greek Old Testament spells the word without any accents, cf. Septuaginta : id est Vetus T ...
ite period to the end of the
Byzantine period
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
. Hecht believed that archeology was an important expression of
Zionism
Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת ''Tsiyyonut'' after '' Zion'') is a nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is known in Je ...
and these ancient artifacts were proof of the link between the Jewish people and
Eretz Israel
The Land of Israel () is the traditional Jewish name for an area of the Southern Levant. Related biblical, religious and historical English terms include the Land of Canaan, the Promised Land, the Holy Land, and Palestine (see also Isra ...
.
Exhibits
Exhibits display the archaeology and history of the Land of Israel in chronological sequence,
from the
Chalcolithic
The Copper Age, also called the Chalcolithic (; from grc-gre, χαλκός ''khalkós'', "copper" and ''líthos'', "stone") or (A)eneolithic (from Latin '' aeneus'' "of copper"), is an archaeological period characterized by regular ...
period to the Byzantine period. Exhibits include coins, weights,
Semitic seals, jewelry, artifacts from the
Temple Mount
The Temple Mount ( hbo, הַר הַבַּיִת, translit=Har haBayīt, label=Hebrew, lit=Mount of the House f the Holy}), also known as al-Ḥaram al-Sharīf (Arabic: الحرم الشريف, lit. 'The Noble Sanctuary'), al-Aqsa Mosque compou ...
excavations; Phoenician metalworking, woodworking, stone vessels, glass making, and mosaics. The museum is also home to the
Ma'agan Michael Ship, the wreck of a fifth-century BCE merchantman. The museum art collection includes French painting of the
Barbizon School
The Barbizon school of painters were part of an art movement towards Realism in art, which arose in the context of the dominant Romantic Movement of the time. The Barbizon school was active roughly from 1830 through 1870. It takes its name ...
,
Impressionism
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...
,
Post-impressionism
Post-Impressionism (also spelled Postimpressionism) was a predominantly French art movement that developed roughly between 1886 and 1905, from the last Impressionist exhibition to the birth of Fauvism. Post-Impressionism emerged as a reaction a ...
, and the
School of Paris
The School of Paris (french: École de Paris) refers to the French and émigré artists who worked in Paris in the first half of the 20th century.
The School of Paris was not a single art movement or institution, but refers to the importance ...
, and Jewish art from mid-nineteenth to early twentieth century. The museum owns paintings by
Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot,
Édouard Manet
Édouard Manet (, ; ; 23 January 1832 – 30 April 1883) was a French modernist painter. He was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life, as well as a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism to Impressionism.
Bo ...
,
Claude Monet
Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. Durin ...
,
Camille Jacob Pissarro,
Vincent van Gogh
Vincent Willem van Gogh (; 30 March 185329 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who posthumously became one of the most famous and influential figures in Western art history. In a decade, he created about 2,100 artworks, inc ...
,
Amedeo Modigliani,
Max Liebermann
Max Liebermann (20 July 1847 – 8 February 1935) was a German painter and printmaker, and one of the leading proponents of Impressionism in Germany and continental Europe. In addition to his activity as an artist, he also assembled an important ...
.
Activities
The museum has an acoustic auditorium that seats 380
and a
pipe organ, built by Gideon Shamir from parts of organs used in churches throughout the country over a century ago. It also serves as a study center for students and academic researchers, offering enrichment studies in archaeology, art, Bible, and history for schoolchildren, soldiers, teachers and the public at large.
The Museum holds an annual art competition open to high-school students, soldiers, and fine arts students. Winners of the competition are granted scholarships by the
Hecht Foundation, which also awards fellowships to M.A. and Ph.D. students in the Departments of Archeology and
Maritime Civilizations. The Museum holds conferences,
symposia
''Symposia'' is a genus of South American araneomorph spiders in the family Cybaeidae, and was first described by Eugène Simon in 1898.
Species
it contains six species in Venezuela
Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic o ...
, seminars, and lectures and publishes catalogs of its exhibitions of archeology and art.
Journal
''Michmanim'', the museum journal, publishes scholarly articles on archaeological research and artifacts in the museum collection.
See also
*
List of Israeli museums
Below is an incomplete list of Israeli museums, some of which are located in East Jerusalem.
References
External links
Israel's official national museum portal{{in lang, en
*
Museums
Israel
Museums
Museums
Israel
Israel (; he, י ...
*
Visual arts in Israel
Visual arts in Israel refers to plastic art created first in the region of Palestine, from the later part of the 19th century until 1948 and subsequently in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories by Israeli artists. Visual art in Israel ...
References
External links
The Hecht MuseumUniversity of Haifa
{{authority control
Archaeological museums in Israel
Museums in Haifa
History museums in Israel
Museums established in 1984
University museums in Israel
University of Haifa
Museums of Ancient Near East in Israel
1984 establishments in Israel