Museums in Moldova will open their doors on an enlightening night

Museums in Moldova invite visitors on the night from Saturday to Sunday to an enlightening and entertaining event, part of the “Night of the Museums” held in 39 European countries, Info-Prim Neo reports. This initiative originated in 1999, when French museums, supported by numerous museums across Europe, launched the Spring of Museums Campaign to increase public awareness of the rich collections and cultural experience of museums. Six years later, in 2005, the Spring of Museums was succeeded by another event – Night of Museums – to attract a broader category of visitors, including young people and families. The success of the first edition, which was joined by 1200 museums from 32 countries, led to the idea to associate this event with the International Museum Day, placed under the patronage of the International Council of Museums. The Night has enjoyed growing popularity since, receiving 1.2 million visitors in 2006 in France alone. This year's edition, themed "Museums and Universal Heritage", will engage almost 2,000 European museums from 39 countries, including Moldova. All participating museums will open their doors free of charge to share their treasures with young and old. The National History Museum of Moldova alone will display more than 263 thousand exhibits, of which 165 thousand are original pieces of the national Moldovan heritage. As part of the event, the "Night of Museums" will also illustrate the goal of European museums to become part of a common project designed to discover different identities and cultures. The following major European cities have already agreed to participate actively in this event: Baku, Brussels, Zagreb, Barcelona, Madrid, Lisbon, Belgrade, Tallinn, Budapest, Venice, Palermo, Riga, Vilnius, Krakow, Warsaw and Bucharest. “The Night of the Museums” is placed under the high patronage of the Council of Europe.