Koran Holder, Koshering Board, and fake Meat Cutter

The Koran Holder, Koshering Board, and the fake Meat Cutter communicate issues of authenticity and the slippery nature of signs on objects. The Koran Holder was one of the original donations to the museum by Maurice Spertus and with its six-pointed star it was initially mistaken for a Siddur case. However, it is actually an Islamic object. Without a reason for being in a Jewish museum, the Koran Holder raises the issue of how reading an object can be mutable, affecting its value.

As a counter point to the Koran Holder, the unusual presence of the six-pointed Magen David on the Koshering Board points to the same possible misreading. Yet, crafted by a Jewish artisan, the Koshering Board was a gift to the artist’s mother to cut fish for the Friday night Sabbath meal and is thus a Judaic object. On the other hand, the crudely fashioned fake Meat Cutter, also a part of Maurice’s original gift, is obviously not a kosher object due to its dull edges and decorative aesthetic, pointing to its lack of utility. Although the fake Meat Cutter can be considered Jewish by its representation and Hebrew lettering spelling “kosher”, the Meat Cutter does not function as a kosher object. As a result, within an institutional setting the cutter’s value is diminished, as it is not considered a Jewish object despite its symbolic references.

Interestingly, placed together these objects relate by not relating; within an institutional setting, these objects intermingle and provoke questions of authenticity and how this designation changes depending on context and perspective. In particular, the fake Meat Cutter highlights the presence of three levels of institutional criticism occurring; because the Meat Cutter is deemed not kosher, it points to the authenticity of the Koshering board, while also highlighting the Koran Holder as being authentic only out of a cultural institution setting. In this context, however, it holds a different value and presence. These relations point to the additional narratives that are affixed to these objects once brought into an institution that would otherwise not exist.

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