#Exhibit of the Month

The exhibited necklace of beads originates from Funerary Complex No. 6 of Kurgan No. 4, excavated in 1982 by Dr. Habil. Eugen SAVA near the town of Taraclia. The beads were found in the chest area of the deceased, indicating that they had been worn as a necklace and had remained in their original position within the funerary assemblage.
The necklace consists of 11 elements made entirely of Egyptian faience. Eight of the beads are spherical and decorated with vertical incisions forming between 14 and 21 raised ribs. Their diameters range from 13 to 20 mm. Two additional elements are scarab representations measuring 23.5 × 19.5 mm, while the final component is a flattened cylindrical pendant bead featuring a central vertical groove and measuring 22 × 9 mm. The objects range in color from light blue to dark blue and violet hues, reflecting the natural deterioration and glaze variations characteristic of Egyptian faience.
Egyptian faience is an artificial quartz-based material coated with an alkaline glaze, typically blue or blue-green in color. It was widely used in Ancient Egypt and later spread throughout the Mediterranean and Pontic regions through trade networks. During the first centuries AD, such objects served as important indicators of cultural and economic contacts between the Mediterranean world and the communities of the North Pontic region.
Owing to its typological, technological, and symbolic characteristics, the Taraclia necklace is an exceptionally valuable artifact for the study of intercultural relations, the circulation of prestige goods, and the funerary practices of the Sarmatian communities during the first centuries AD (1st-2nd centuries AD).

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Exhibitions

“Academician Alexei Shchusev. Life and Works" 150 years since the birth

Within the European Heritage Days

September 28 – October 15, 2023

The exhibition is dedicated to the 150th anniversary of the birth of the famous architect Alexei Shchusev, corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR.

The future architect and academician was born on September 26, 1873 in Chisinau. He graduated from Male Gymnasium no. 2 in Chisinau (1891) and the Imperial Academy of Fine Arts in Saint Petersburg (1897).

After the successful restoration of St. Basil Church in Ovruch, he was awarded the title of academician of architecture (1910).

He was a teacher at the Vkhutemas Art School (1918-1926), president of the Moscow Architectural Society (1921-1929), director of the Tretyakov Gallery (1926-1929). In 1946, he was appointed director of the Museum of Russian Architecture in Moscow, which today bears his name.

In 1947, in the house where he was born and raised, the Museum of Architecture and Construction Technologies of the City of Chisinau was opened, renamed after the death of the architect into the House Museum of Alexei Shchusev (1949).

The exhibition "Academician Alexei Shchusev. Life and Works" brings together about 150 museum showpieces from the holdings of the National Museum of History of Moldova: works of art, photographs, documents, books, objects of numismatics and philately, other relics intended to reconstruct unknown pages from the life and activity of the famous architect.

At the beginning of his career, Alexei Shchusev was inspired by religious themes. Among the many monuments designed by the architect, one can admire the Church of the Holy Trinity in the village of Cuhurestii de Sus of the Republic of Moldova.

Design projects for the Square of the Cathedral, the Chisinau Theater, the Government House, the quarter of the State University of Moldova, the Măzărache and Râșcani hills, the banks of the Bîc River presented to visitors for the first time are just some of the projects developed by academician Alexei Shchusev, which were to be brought to life within the framework of the Urban Plan for the Reconstruction and Rehabilitation of Post-War Chisinau. Unfortunately, they did not progress beyond the project stage.

The exhibition is conceived as a tribute to the famous architect and academician on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of his birth. It is addressed to specialists in the field, as well as to the general public interested in the life and work of Alexei Shchusev.