Project sheds light on Hanukkah

A new public project, to be run over the coming 50 years, is set to commemorate the city’s ‘Jewtown’. Managed by the National Sculpture Factory and Cork City Council and supported by Bord Gáis, a special lighting event at Shalom Park will mark the final day of the Jewish holiday, Hanukkah, which takes place on Tuesday, December 27th. The aim of the initiative, entitled Evening Echo, is to recognise the presence of the Jewish community in the city.

Created by New Zealand artist Maddie Leach, the project involves the installation of three new lamps in Shalom Park to match the green’s existing six lights. The configuration of these nine lamps will make reference to the candelabra lit every year during the Jewish festival of Hanukkah. It is envisioned that each year, on the final day of Hanukkah, the taller lamp in Shalom Park will light for a number of minutes at twilight, followed by the remaining eight.

Director of the National Sculpture Factory Mary McCarthy described the artwork as “significant”, adding that it evolved over three years. “The project has initiated many new conversations and relationships between communities and it is an ambitious project. Yet it’s apparently simple in its realisation and optimistic in its intent, in that it nods to a distant future as well as spotlighting significant events in the past,” she said.

Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Cork Hebrew Congregation, Fred Rosehill added that the event was a “historic and fitting commemoration” of Cork’s Jewish history. “Shalom Park and the surrounding hinterland, still affectionately known as Jewtown by some older residents of the area, served as a focal point for the community in its heyday, in the later part of the 19th century,” he said. “I think it is fitting and appropriate that all these years later, when the community has seen significant decline due to emigration, that this live commemoration will keep the memory of the former residents of the area alive.”

The Evening Echo event will take place on Tuesday, December 27th at approximately 4.17pm to 4.25pm.