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As part of the exhibition The Opposite of Now: Artistic Paths to a Different Present (in German)
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His followers saw him as the Messiah; to his opponents, he was a charlatan, even a heretic: Jakob Frank, born in Korolówka, Poland, in 1726 and died in Offenbach am Main in 1791, was one of the most enigmatic figures in 18th-century Europe. As the leader of the mystical Frankist movement, Jakob Frank was determined to open up his people – the Jews of Eastern Europe – to the modern age; throughout his life, he championed their rights, freedom, equality and emancipation.
In the Books of Jakob (Die Jakobsbücher), Nobel Prize-winner Olga Tokarczuk paints a portrait of a controversial historical figure and a panorama of a world in crisis on the threshold of modernity. At the same time, however, this metaphysical yet vibrant novel is a book for our times, as it poses the question of how we can imagine the world as a just place.
In the exhibition The Opposite of Now, the artist Daniel Laufer explores the life of Eva Frank, the daughter and successor of Jakob Frank. She lived as the manifestation of the Shekhinah, the female Messiah, with her followers at Isenburg Castle in Offenbach am Main.
Moderators: Monika Sommerer, Head of the JMB Library, and Lothar Quinkenstein, translator.