Expert Analysis
The History of Wooden Synagogues
The aesthetics and the spirit of Europe’s long-vanished wooden synagogues constructed in the villages and settlements of Eastern Europe from the 17th to the early 20th centuries, continue to inspire and serve as catalysts for cultural innovation in the present day.
In April 2025, I published a blog that traced the history of these buildings, and described artworks that the synagogues had inspired. The American artist Frank Stella created the “Polish Village” series of groundbreaking wall pieces from the early 1970s, that blurred the line between painting and sculpture. Beginning in 2003, the Handshouse Studio foundation’s “Wooden Synagogue Project” brought together teams of researchers, craftspeople and volunteers, who designed and fabricated an exact replica of the Gwoździec Synagogue, now on permanent display at Warsaw’s History of Polish Jews Museum. The eye-popping installation led to the 2025 publication of “The Ceiling,” a children’s book about community involvement in the planning and elaborate decoration of the ceiling of a wooden synagogue in a 19th century village.
What is Nabatele?
The wooden synagogue has literally popped up again in the guise of a massive helium balloon skimming the sky above the lagoon in Venice’s Castello District, to the delight of tourists and visitors attending the Venice Biennale. “Nabatele,” which translates as a faintly heard warning signal, is an environmental work conceived by the young Ukrainian conceptual artist Anna Kamyshan, whose career has largely focused on the renovation and reimagining of war memorials and Holocaust sites. “Nabatele” is on view from July to September of this year.
A massive network of rocks, earth and roots emerges from the synagogue’s base, a visual metaphor for the settlement, dislocation and migration patterns of the Jewish people throughout history. Although the synagogue’s interior is not visible, the glow of the eternal light from its windows suggests the strength and comfort derived from belief, tradition and family, bolstering communities and supporting individuals as they adapt to new countries and cultures.
With its easily accessible layers of meanings and evocations, “Nabatele” is a crowd-pleaser, reflecting a legacy of memory, culture and faith, and referencing the history of Venice’s Jewish ghetto, Sholem Aleichem’s novels and the shtetl fantasies of Marc Chagall. Created by a team of engineers, 3D modelers and meteorologists, the balloon synagogue is never still; its movements controlled by outside elements.
Funded by the Montreal Jewish Museum and other benefactors, the art installation is included among the offerings of the Yiddishland Pavilion, an organization that annually produces Yiddish and heritage-themed performing arts events during the Biennale, but which is independent from it.
How does the title enhance the meaning of the work? It poses an open-ended question: Does the fate of the wooden synagogue mirror that of the Jews? Must vigilance, now internalized as an essential part of being Jewish, always remain a constant?
It’s hoped that “Nabatele” itself can travel as a temporary installation, when it can be seen in various cities across the globe.
Maria Veits and Yevgeniy Fiks, Yiddishland’s curators, have noted:
“‘Nabatele’” does not simply represent Yiddishland—it embodies it, materializing its diasporic form of belonging and giving presence to a peoplehood untethered from territory.”
As Director of Conceptual Development at Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center in Kyiv, Anna Kamyshan developed a 100-year plan for the site that will include special installations involving what has been termed “architectural interventions.” The renowned Martina Abramović is among the roster of artists and architects whose work will be a part of the new Babyn Yar memorial, which is intended to generate an authentic experience of the land, its history, and its physical conditions.
Cheryl Kempler is an art and music specialist who works in the B’nai B’rith International Curatorial Office and writes about history and Jewish culture for B’nai B’rith Magazine. To view some of her additional content, click here.