#ARCTIC. #SIBERIA. THIS IS TAIMYR. The opening of a new ethnographic exhibition of the Nomadic Culture Museum – Dolgan Balok – took place in Moscow. Now this living, natural corner of the Far North can be freely visited by the capital residents and guests.
This largest ethnographic museum is the only one of its kind in the world. Its peculiarity is that all the exhibits here are located in the open air and are expositions of cultures of different peoples of the world – some islands of small ethnic groups’ life, their activities, way of life, where everything is real, everything is original, without forgery. Here you can find a Mongolian yurt and a Nenets tent, the home of Australian aborigines and a Kazakh farmstead.
The museum has more than 60 exhibitions, and the main fund is more than 15 thousand items. It can be replenished through constant development work. The institution employees go on business trips all over the planet, conduct scientific research, and acquire new exhibits. In August of this year, for example, an expedition from the Nomadic Culture Museum worked in the rural settlement of Hatanga.
Muscovites got acquainted with the conditions and specifics of the local population life, talked with people leading a traditional way of life, and visited the reindeer herders’ camp in the tundra. They managed to replenish the collection of Dolgan and Nganasan national clothing, collect household items, crafts and other exhibits. Now residents and guests of Moscow can see all this. As the Nomadic Culture Museum’s director Konstantin Kuksin shared the news, Dolgan balok has become a new ethnographic exhibition of the open-air institution he created.
At the opening celebration, the expedition members told that they covered hundreds of kilometers between 72 and 73 degrees north latitude in the cold cargo ship hold, on motor boats, sledges and snowmobiles in search of unique ethnographic material. Visitors were shown videos, photographs based on travel materials, and even taught to throw a maut. There were many pleasant surprises on that day. And the museum staff remembered with gratitude their Taimyr friends, the Dolgans and Nganasans, thanks to whose participation and help this wonderful exhibition became possible.
Follow us on Telegram, VKontakte.
Text: Elena Popova, Photo: provided by the Nornickel Polar Division press service