Boston Jewish community forced to cancel plan for arts and cultural center

Boston's Jewish community has abandoned a US$ 80 million project for an arts and cultural center designed by the renowned New York architect Daniel Libeskind. The plan for the New Center for the Arts and Culture, announced in 2004, as well as other cultural projects slated for development on the newly created Rose Kennedy Greenway, was dropped due to a lack of funding in the current economic climate, according to Francine Achbar, the center's executive director. “The business we were always in was gathering programs and offering cultural experiences seen from the Jewish perspective,” she said. New Center will continue to host its programs in venues throughout the city, she told the news agency JTA.

The New Center effort was launched originally in a collaboration between the Greater Boston Jewish Community Centers and the Combined Jewish Philanthropies to bring cultures together through the arts. The idea was based on research that showed that the arts, and Jewish arts and cultural programs, would attract many Jews who are not otherwise engaged in Jewish organizations.