Reconstruction of Ethnographic Museum in Belgrade for its 110th birthday

(Photo: ekapija)

Last year's flooding of the premises in the Ethnographic Museum additionally underlined the necessity of reconstruction of the house of culture, which will celebrate its 110th birthday next year. The museum at the Students Square got the status of a monument of culture in 1984, and its collection includes nearly 160,000 items.

Roof on one of the oldest houses in the Balkans is leaking, granite facades are falling apart, windows are worn out. All that was the reason for Miroslava Stopić, a member of the Municipal Council, to visit the Ethnographic Museum on February 17th. The borough of Stari Grad has received the appeal for financial help for reparation and replacement of windows on the fourth and the fifth floor. According to BeoInfo, the works would cost 1,700,000 RSD.

– We in Ethnographic Museum are very grateful to the borough of Stari Grad, which has recently helped us purchase a video surveillance system for exhibition rooms and official entrance. We are now asking the borough to help us in reparation of the internal window wings and replacement of external carpentry on the fourth and the fifth floor where the storage for folk costumes and textile is situated. Water seriously damaged these windows and it is necessary to have 13 windows and one balcony door repaired – said Vilma Niškanović, the Acting Director of this cultural institution. She said that the Museum had the project for complete reorganization of the yard and external facades, as well as roof structure, which was elaborated by the experts from the Faculty of Architecture in Belgrade. The Ministry of Culture has already set aside 4m RSD from its budget for the commencement of these works.

Ethnographic Museum organizes the International Festival of Ethnographic Film for 19 consecutive years. The Festival is organized between October 14 and 18 and, according to the words of the Museum Director, the aid of the borough would be precious.