Exhibition Opening: BELF. History of a Viennese Jewish Bookstore

Exhibition opening with a presentation, guided tour through the exhibition, and vegetarian reception.

March 1938: In the wake of the National Socialist seizure of power, members of the Jewish Belf family, who operate a publishing house and a bookstore, are subjected to violent abuse by Nazi paramilitaries and the Gestapo. During the pogrom in November 1938, also known as ‘Kristallnacht’, Nazi troops loot the business at 3 Rabensteig Street in Vienna’s First District and deport its owner, Josef Belf, to the Dachau concentration camp.

These harrowing events, repeated hundreds of times in Vienna alone, marked the end of a company which, for decades, had supplied the Viennese Jewish community with traditional literature and objects for religious practice, thus enabling and strengthening Jewish self-determination and identity.

The exhibition, which will be on display at the Contemporary History Library from April 29 to October 31, illustrates the history of aJewish family business with historical photographs and a collection of books published or sold by the firm. The fate of the Belf bookstore encapsulates the systematic eradication of religious, cultural, intellectual, and ultimately physical, Jewish life in Vienna.