REMEMBRANCE IN TIME - Index of

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Remembrance in Time
Museum in the town of Kotel, Vasil Levski Museum in the town of Lovech, Yordan
Yovkov Museum in the town of Dobrich. In the halls of these museums experts maintain
more factual exhibitions which contain significant amount of artifacts and documents.
Representative and pleasant stone or bronze monuments often take place in the area of
museum complex.
Museum exhibitions
Typically exhibitions are arranged in a traditional way. Most of them consist of two
parts – a reconstruction of the antithetic interior and a classical museum exposure.
Personal belongings of the famous person are key components of the museum narrative.
The biographical facts are also described in relevant texts. In some cases copies of the
original artifacts are exposed. This is valid for personalities which public cult is presented
in several museums. Pieces of art, manuscripts, first editions of significant books,
personal letters are strongly preferred as major components of museum exhibitions. There
are some controversial exponents in the Bulgarian memorial museums. For example in
the hall of the Aleko Konstantinov Museum in Svishtov the preserved heart of the great
Bulgarian writer is shown in a glass vessel.
The permanent exhibitions of memorial museums are highly contextual. Almost
everywhere the local story and the concrete event are laid in the national frame. This
repeatability gives some uniformity of the museum landscape. On the other hand the
approach creates conditions for drawing larger historical images trough specific museum
items. Furthermore the museum exhibitions reconstruct family contacts, strengths
friendships, and professional clans around prominent personalities.
The majority of Bulgarian museums trace the life and carrier of public personalities
chronologically. The museum narrative focuses the attention of the audience on
significant activities of the prominent historical figure. The emphasis is mostly
achieved with traditional means – combination of text, photographs, and artifacts.
The Bulgarian model of museum expression has a specific feature – a strong
preference for facsimiles, documents, books. Thus museum exhibitions acquire the
appearance of archival collections. In many cases museum exhibition highlights
history events rather via texts than vision effects. This makes a significant part of the
exposures boring for young people whose consciousness is obsessed with the vision
and digital technology.
Museum perspectives
Memorial museums are highly appreciated in Bulgarian society. Their impact is
connected to the cult of national heroes. Part of the museums is included in the system of
celebration of public holidays. Museums of prominent artists – writers, musicians,
painters – are centers of educational activities. Often the memorial museum is a major
cultural institution in the area. This situation is typical for small towns and villages. For
these reasons the museum network associated with memory to the great personalities
should be strengthened and improved.