When photographer Julian Voloj moved to New York in 2004, he was fascinated by the diversity of the city's Jewish communities but also shocked about abandoned synagogues he encountered in former Jewish neighborhoods. 

Having grown up in Germany, he was used to discover former synagogues, forgotten cemeteries or other places with a Jewish past. In a city that continuously reinvents itself, recent pasts were so quickly forgotten, so he set out to document the Jewish heritage in neighborhoods such as Harlem, the South Bronx or Brownsville, places once home to vibrant Jewish communities.

The project became a race against the clock, as many of the buildings were in bad condition and the threat of demolition loomed. Other Jewish buildings had been reinvented as churches, community centers and residential apartments. 

The black and white of Julian Voloj's photographs give them an historic character. They seem to be images of a distant past but were taken in the recent present. With his work, Julian Voloj also examines the way Americans approach their own heritage, as well as the way culture is reborn and reinvented in a city in permanent transition. 

Julian Voloj is an award-winning writer and photographer. Born to Colombian parents in Germany, where he studied literature and linguistics, Julian moved to New York in 2004. The city and its inhabitants are often subjects of his photographic work and graphic novels.