Ceiling of the Great Synagogue, Plzen, Czech Republic, 2013
Ceiling of the Great Synagogue, Plzen, Czech Republic, 2013
Velká synagoga - The Great Synagogue of Plzen was inaugurated in 1893. The mixed style building quickly became one of the city’s landmarks. It features a façade with two 45-meter-high towers crowned by onion domes, a large Star of David window above gothic arches and below a lombard frieze and the Tablets of the Law. The interior follows a gothic plan with an apse harboring the Ark of Law and the bimah. Women’s gallery is located on the first floor on both sides of the prayer hall and on a large balcony on the western wall.
The synagogue served the Jewish community of Plzen until the Holocaust. After WW II, survivors of the decimated Jewish community used to pray in the synagogue with the last service held in 1973. In the following years the building was neglected and fall in disrepair. Restoration work could be undertaken only after the fall of the Communist regime in Czechoslovakia. The synagogue was opened again in 1998 and has since served as a venue for cultural activities and exhibitions. Members of the small Jewish community of Plzen pray in the formerly winter prayer room.
Photo: Haim H. Ghiuzeli
The Oster Visual Documentation Center, ANU - Museum of the Jewish People, courtesy of Haim H. Ghiuzeli, Israel