COLLECTOR/CONNOISSEUR The Max N. Berry Collections Selected Hannukah Lamps

In Celebration of Hanukkah, Christie’s is pleased to present a selection of Hanukkah lamps (Hanukkah menorahs) from the collection of renowned Judaica collector Max N. Berry.

Hanukkah is an annual eight-day Jewish festival that begins on 14 December this year. It commemorates the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem around 164 BCE, after Jewish fighters, the Maccabees, successfully resisted the Seleucid Empire and reclaimed the Temple. They found only one day’s worth of purified oil to light the Temple’s menorah but, miraculously, the oil lasted for eight days.

Jews around the world celebrate this blessing by lighting a nine-branched candelabrum (one candle for each night plus a shamash candle to light the others) for eight days. The act of lighting the candles to celebrate this extraordinary event, resilience and joy has become the symbolic language of one of the most recognizable rituals of Jewish tradition.

The Hanukkah lamps offered here include early 19th- and 20th-century brass and silver designs from Europe, America and Israel, including examples by the Bezalel School of Art & Design, as well as Brutalist iron sculptures by David Palombo (1920–1966). The many interpretations of form speak to the aesthetic of each country’s origin as well as Berry’s passionate collecting journey.