In a Feb. 16 letter to CJC, Quebec region president Victor Goldbloom, Jean Pelletier said that carnival organizers had no intention of causing offence and they will be more vigilant in the future.

The sculpture was created by Ukrainian Pitro Romaniuk as part of series of works said to represent different figures in his country’s traditional celebration of Christmas.

Visitor Jake Burack, a McGill University professor, had complained on Feb. 11 that the figure of a hook-nosed, bearded man in a kippah clutching a bag of money was reminiscent of the negative depictions of Jews in Europe before World War II.

The sculpture was on view for a week until the end of the carnival on Feb. 15. Organizers said the carnival drew about 400,000 visitors.

The text beside the sculpture explained that it represented “a theatrical piece that takes place in our country on Christmas night. The story’s characters – the astrologer, the czar, the warrior, the Jew, Death and the goat – are divided into positive and negative heroes. They represent, in an ironic and satirical form, people’s lives.”

All the characters were aboard a boat “symbolizing the birth of Goodness.”

Pelletier wrote to Goldbloom that the description that was received with Romaniuk’s application to create the sculpture “did not permit the selection committee to conclude this was an anti-Semitic representation. If that had been the case, the committee would never have accepted such a work.”

Pelletier said organizers will try to ensure that something like this does not happen again at the carnival, which is in its 55th year.

“We are satisfied with the response,” said CJC, Quebec region executive director Daniel Amar.

He spoke to Pelletier by phone for about half an hour and said that he found him to be “very open to the Jewish community,” having hosted members of the Toronto Jewish community at his home while they were in Quebec learning French.

“The sculpture was a mistake. He recognizes that,” Amar said. “But [the carnival organizers] were acting in good faith.”

Pelletier said Burack’s was the only complaint the carnival received about the sculpture. Amar said CJC received two e-mails from members of the Montreal Jewish community who were concerned about the sculpture.

However, Rabbi Reuben Poupko, a CJC national officer whose family roots are in Ukraine, takes a less benign view of this “bizarre” incident.

He found the sculpture “flagrantly offensive” and feels the carnival organizers should have removed it as soon as it was brought to their attention.

He thinks that the appearance of the word “Jew” in the sculptor’s application should have raised a red flag in the first place, and if it did not, the completed sculpture should have been plainly unacceptable in 2009.

“Also, I find it incredible that 400,000 people visited the carnival and no one said anything [besides Burack].”