
Nicole Eisenman’s Seder (2010) is the focus of the fourth entry in the Jewish Museum’s “Masterpieces & Curiosities” exhibition series, which aims to construct associative networks among the museum’s eclectic holdings. The painting hangs in a glass case—a semi-ironic nod to the function of display to produce, well, masterpieces and curiosities. Spotlit in the dim room, Seder is radiant. Eisenman has summoned a variety of painterly styles to depict the seder’s guests. Her scene therefore seems more like a collage of histories than a Rockwellian slice of life, and this impression is enhanced by the motley constellation on the wall to Seder’s right, with portraits plucked from every decade of the 20th century. A case on the opposite wall holds a selection of seder plates from the museum’s Judaica collection, including a simple clay-colored one split into wedges labeled “BITTER HERBS,” “NOT SO BITTER HERBS,” “EGG!” and so on, made by Eisenman herself.