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    [Vishniac's daughter Mara posing in front of a shop specializing in instruments that measure the difference in size between Aryan and non-Aryan skulls, Berlin]

    Object Name
    016
    Date1933
    Label Text

    In April 1933, the Nazi government issued a decree that codified the definition of a non-Aryan, associating Aryan identity with biological characteristics. Vishniac’s photograph of his daughter Mara, age seven, standing in front of a store previously owned by a Jew, includes a window display exhibiting pamphlets on Aryan race theory and advertising an instrument used to measure human heads, demonstrating that the Aryan skull is long and thin. The window sign reads “Nurture [your] race!” and advertises an instrument invented by “race researcher” R. Burger-Villingen that measures the cranium facial features to prove one’s Aryan race. A poster in the store window promotes an organization founded in 1933 to disseminate Nazi ideology among the German middle classes and to enforce the boycott of Jewish businesses.

    Inscribed
    "Measuring device for Races. Berlin, 1933" written on LL, on mount, recto
    Medium
    Gelatin silver print
    Dimensions
    Image: 10 x 12 in. (25.4 x 30.5 cm) Paper: 11 x 14 in. (27.9 x 35.6 cm) Mount: 16 x 19 1/2 in. (40.6 x 49.5 cm)
    Location
    place taken Berlin, Germany
    Credit Line
    Gift of Mara Vishniac Kohn, 2013
    Accession Number1992.231.a
    Copyright
    © Mara Vishniac Kohn