TALK: The Borscht Belt: Revisiting the Remains of America's Jewish Vacationland

Description

At the peak of its popularity, New York’s Catskills region—dubbed the Borscht Belt because of its popularity with Jewish vacationers—was home to hundreds of hotels, vacation bungalows, and clubs where top comedians and other performers regularly appeared. But the region’s economic decline saw many of them close, falling victim to fire, vandalism, wrecking balls, and decay. Photographer Marisa Scheinfeld spent years documenting the fate of those places through a series of evocative images, now collected in her new book, which also includes essays by Stefan Kanfer and Jenna Weissman Joselit. Scheinfeld will sign copies of the book after her talk.