The Jewish Arts Quarter belongs to all of us
Chairman Jack Gringlas shares why he truly believes in Melbourne's Jewish Arts Quarter and how it will preserve Jewish culture, while allowing it to be experienced and shared.
There are moments in the life of a community when something remarkable becomes possible – not just admirable in concept, but genuinely within reach.
The Jewish Arts Quarter (JAQ) is one of those moments. I believe it is the most significant cultural project our Melbourne Jewish community has undertaken in a generation, and I want to tell you why I have chosen, at this stage of my life, to step forward as chairman.
I have spent more than four decades building things – engineering businesses, investment partnerships and community institutions. Throughout my professional life, I have learnt to assess projects critically, ask difficult questions and commit only when I genuinely believe something has the capacity to endure and succeed. I do not lend my name or my time lightly.
Which is why I want to be clear: I believe deeply in the Jewish Arts Quarter.
Over 30 years on the board of Bialik College – including three years as president – I watched generations of Jewish children develop their identity, their values, and their voices. It was that service, and the broader communal contribution it represented, for which I was honoured to receive the Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) in 2014. And as chair of the fundraising committee for the Emmy Monash Aged Care development, I witnessed how bold vision, collective commitment and philanthropy can become lasting institutions that serve our people for decades.
Those experiences taught me something important: buildings are never just buildings. The institutions we create shape the strength, confidence and continuity of our community long after we are gone.
The Jewish Arts Quarter is genuinely extraordinary. It will be a world-class cultural precinct uniting the Jewish Museum of Australia: Gandel Centre of Judaica, the Kadimah Jewish Cultural Centre and National Library, performance spaces, exhibitions, learning programs, festivals and community gathering spaces.
It will not simply preserve Jewish culture behind glass, but allow it to be experienced, shared and lived and this is extremely important now, when Jewish communities around the world are confronting rising antisemitism and increasing social division.
What makes this project remarkable is the extraordinary external validation it has already attracted. The Australian federal government has pledged $18 million. The Victorian government has committed $7 million. Glen Eira City Council has been fully supportive throughout.
When governments at all three levels align behind a project of this kind, it is clearly a considered judgement by people whose job it is to assess community benefit.
Government funding alone cannot complete this journey. Like all Jewish communal spaces today, JAQ carries unavoidable security requirements – a level of protection that previous generations could scarcely have imagined. Those costs are real, and our community must understand they are part of what we are building.
JAQ will only reach its potential if our whole community chooses to embrace it.
It is our community – individuals, families and foundations who care deeply about Jewish cultural life in Australia – that will determine whether this project reaches its potential.
I recently celebrated my 75th birthday. I have four children, nine grandchildren and a deep belief that the institutions we build today become the inheritance we leave future generations tomorrow.
One day, our children and grandchildren will ask what we built for them – whether we invested in Jewish life with confidence rather than fear, whether we ensured Jewish culture would continue to flourish openly in Australia.
I believe the Jewish Arts Quarter is our opportunity to answer those questions with conviction. If you are wondering whether this project deserves your support – financially, morally or publicly – my answer is simple: I would not be here if I were not certain.
This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity for our community to build something lasting, visible and deeply meaningful – not only for ourselves, but for the generations that follow.
I encourage every member of our community to take an interest in this project, to speak about it, to advocate for it and, where possible, to support it.
The Jewish Arts Quarter belongs to all of us, and together we can ensure it becomes a defining legacy for Jewish life in Melbourne.
Jack Gringlas OAM is chairman of the Jewish Arts Quarter (JAQ).
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