#Exhibit of the Month

The main parts of the camera include the body, bellows, lens, and viewfinder system. The body consists of two lacquered walnut wood frames, joined by a folding black textile bellows that allows the necessary extension for focusing. On the front panel is the Agfa anastigmat lens, mounted in a Compur-type shutter produced by F. Deckel in Munich. It features a foldable "brilliant" viewfinder for both portrait and landscape orientation. It uses glass photographic plates coated with a photographic emulsion, mounted in walnut wood holders, with a frame size of 9x12 cm.
The walnut wood model, considered the flagship "Agfa Isolar Luxus," was designed by the A.H. Rietzschel factory in Munich, acquired by AGFA in 1925, which continued producing this type of camera under its own name until the late 1920s.
The piece was restored by Mihail Culașco, Restoration Department of NMHM.
Brief History of the Camera
The history of the camera spans 200 years, evolving from the camera obscura to today's digital devices. Key milestones include: the first permanent photograph in 1826 by French physicist Joseph Nicéphore Niépce, using a wooden box and a plate coated with bitumen of Judea; the invention of the first photographic process - daguerreotype - in 1839 by Frenchman Louis Daguerre, marking the official birth of photography; the invention of calotype, based on the negative/positive principle, by British physicist and chemist Fox Talbot; the invention of wet collodion plates by Englishman Frederick Scott Archer and dry glass plates by Richard Leach Maddox and John Huds Bennet; the introduction of flexible roll film and the launch of the first Kodak camera by American inventor George Eastman; the release of the first 35 mm film camera by German company "Leica"; the launch of the first instant camera "Polaroid," invented by American Edwin Land. Finally, starting in 1975, this path led to the digital photography revolution. Each successive step made cameras smaller and faster, significantly improving image quality.
The first photographic studio in Chișinău was opened in 1854 by Eduard Glewski, and before World War I, there were already about 100 photography studios in Bessarabia.
The collection of the National Museum of History of Moldova includes over 30 cameras, made in Austria, Germany, France, USSR, Japan, and China, dating from the late 19th century to the 2000s. Among them are folding bellows cameras, BOX-type cameras, single-lens reflex (SLR) and twin-lens reflex (TLR) cameras, as well as digital (DSLR) cameras.

Virtual Tour

Exhibitions

“Walking around Chișinău of the 20th century”

January 4 - February 15, 2021

Chișinău is without a doubt a city of contrasts. This is a locality that exists between "was" and "is". We are keenly experiencing this contrast, we see and feel it every day, and the architecture of the city clearly indicates a transition from the old to the new, being a witness and the main indicator of change.

In the pictures of the beginning of the last century, it appears as a small but very pretty town, and today we are increasingly confronted with the nostalgic expression "here was...": "here was the Diocesan House", "here was the Swiss Hotel", "here was a girls' gymnasium, and in this place the deputies of Sfatul Țării voted for the Union in 1918". Of the pearls of architecture that once delighted citizens, today we have only pictures left. These pictures are the subject of the collection catalogs and today, the unknown treasures of architecture and urban life, reflected in 48 images, are brought to the public's attention in an exhibition dedicated to Chişinău of the 20th century.

Chişinău is an open-air museum where thousands of people lived, loved, created with wisdom and humility the image of a city "carved in white stone". Each street retains the footsteps of those who admired it, whether they were commoners or nobles. Each villa retains a vivid memory of its owners, and some are still waiting for them, and the holy churches of Chişinău are illuminated by the thoughts of those who admired them or crossed their threshold.

This exhibition is a challenge for all of us to rediscover Chișinău at the time when we have and devote so little time for beauty. This is an invitation to take a virtual walk through the streets from the old days and recall known or forgotten views, places loaded with history or feelings. And, like any place that tends to affirm its authenticity through culture, Chișinău, today, perhaps more than ever, needs the exercise of memory in order to survive and develop.