Many Jewish Washingtonians are unaware of two breathtakingly beautiful Israeli art installations in their city that could soon be replaced. But it may not be too late to see them.

While the Kennedy Center had been expected to close for two years for renovations as of July 5, a judge has put that plan in limbo and asked for more information on what the renovations would entail.

As of July 6, there is no scheduled programming at the Kennedy Center, but the building remains open to the public. If guided tours continue, visitors will be able to see the Israeli Lounge, gifted to the Kennedy Center in 1971 in memory of President John F. Kennedy.

After President Kennedy was assassinated, Congress voted to establish the national arts center, then already in its planning stages, in his memory. Many countries donated gifts to the center to honor the slain president, including Orrefors chandeliers, marble from Italy and art from Mexico.

Several countries, including Israel, donated the cost of constructing patron lounges that would include artwork from their lands. The Israeli Lounge, inaugurated in Washington by then ambassador to Washington Yitzhak Rabin, includes a brass mezuzah on the door, and Israeli art that is rich both in meaning and in color.

Against the far wall of the lounge are wood panels with brass and copper cutouts created by Israeli artist Nehemia Azaz that share the words of Psalm 150 and renderings of 42 instruments mentioned in the Old Testament. Above, on the ceiling, are 40 wood panels by Israeli artist Shraga Weil, who used acrylic paints and 22-carat gold leaf to show four musical events from the Old Testament: Joshua at the walls of Jericho, David playing his harp, Miriam dancing after the crossing of the Red Sea and a choir of Levites on the steps of the Temple.

The room is striking in part because Jewish-themed art is just so unexpected in this American cultural landmark, but also because it is just that beautiful.

Whether it will remain the Israeli Lounge and what will happen to the artwork if it doesn’t is unclear. A spokesperson for the Kennedy Center told Washington Jewish Week “… we are actively pursuing new sponsorship opportunities for the Israeli lounge to revitalize the space and amplify the importance of the warm relationship that America shares with Israel in the arts and culture,” and also referred Washington Jewish Week to a quote in an article about the lounge in Jewish Insider by Roma Daravi, vice president of public relations at the Kennedy Center: “The Israeli Lounge, specifically, the contract lapsed 15 years ago, and now it’s up for sale again, and we would love for it to remain a space that honors the Jewish people.”

A spokesperson for the Israeli Embassy in Washington told Washington Jewish Week recently that according to the Kennedy Center, a donor had been found, but Washington Jewish Week has been unable to confirm that.

But even if the likely hundreds of thousands of dollars that would be needed for renovations is raised to update the 50-plus-year-old room, it’s not clear what would happen to the exquisite art on the walls.

Washington Jewish Week visited the Israeli Lounge last week with Ori Soltes, the former director of the B’nai B’rith Klutznick National Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., which closed in 2015. Soltes, who was seeing the Israeli Lounge for the first time, said he thought that both works of art “are interesting representations of one of the many directions Israeli art was taking in the first three decades of its existence in terms of both subject matter and style — turning in both cases back to biblical sources reflects that abiding early Israeli interest in leaping conceptually back to that era, rather than the intervening two diasporic millennia between the end of the Second Temple period and the present.”

Soltes says that even in a refresh there’s no reason not to have the original art remain “but it would certainly make sense to supplement it on the available wall with a handful of more contemporary works.”

Soltes, who noted that the decades-old lounge is indeed “frayed,” says the walls and floors could be renewed “without eliminating the art that is there.”

Other local art experts interviewed by Washington Jewish Week said it’s likely that the Kennedy Center owns the art in the Israeli Lounge, and so, if the art is replaced, the current works could be loaned out for exhibition if there was a space large enough and costs could be covered.

For now, however, check with the Kennedy Center to see if free tours are being given this summer, and do see the beautiful room for yourselves.

If you kiss the mezuzah on the door, you’ll be sharing a memory of the space with this writer.

About 25 years ago, when my father visited Washington, D.C., we decided to take the free tour, since our two kids, who were then about 6 and 8, knew the Kennedy Center, a part of their neighborhood, so well. We had never toured before, and I had no idea there was an Israeli Lounge, so we were all surprised when the docent announced it as the tour’s next stop. We entered the room with our kids, but my immigrant father, then in his 80s, hung back a bit. I turned to see why and saw my dad, who had helped liberate Bergen Belsen and interrogated German POWs as a Canadian naval officer, reverentially touch his fingers to the mezuzah and then brought them to his lips, according to Jewish custom. As he quietly rejoined the tour, the docent paused and turned toward him. “Thank you, sir,” she said warmly, “for raining blessings down on the Kennedy Center.”

Fran Kritz is a freelance writer.