Ilya Rabinovich
Ethnography Museum Chisinau Moldova,
Museutopia project 2008
The Museum of Ethnography and Nature is the first Moldovan museum. Founded in 1889 by Baron Steward, it served as a laboratory for local scientists during the 20th century. The Museum’s building was constructed in 1905, and its Neo-Mauritian style is unique in Moldova. This museum is famous for its geological, paleontological, zoological, entomological, archaeological, ethnographical, and numismatic collections. The area of the Museum’s exposition halls is over 2300 square meters, and it includes an entire Dinoterium Gigantisimus skeleton, which was discovered in 1963. The current permanent exhibition ‘Nature. Man. Culture,’ was inaugurated in 1994. Here, the visitor can see the evolution of the organic world, from primitive organisms to the present stage of the anthropogenesis. One can also follow the sinuous history of the region between the Prut and the Dniester rivers, as well as gain insights into the use of natural resources and ways of improving the ecological situation. The exhibition is a rumination on the dialectics of man and nature in contemporary civilization.