AS PART of its 120th anniversary celebrations, the Slovak National Museum (SNM) is holding commemorative events throughout 2013. On April 23, a festive colloquium was organised at Bratislava Castle to mark the museum’s foundation.
“The national museum survived 120 years, two world wars, several political regimes, the fall of the monarchy, the vanishing of kings, presidents, ministers – and we are still here,” SNM deputy general manager Gabriela Podušelová told the TASR newswire. “We have quite a lot behind us – and I hope that we have 120 more years still ahead of us,” she concluded.
The SNM possesses 3,946,000 exhibits, 105 buildings from Myjava in western Slovakia to Svidník in the east, and two open-air museums (in Martin and Svidník) which both include more than 100 [structures],” Podušelová said. “Also castles like those of Bratislava, Červený Kameň, and Krásna Hôrka fall under the SNM.”
The museum’s task is to collect, organise, list, archive and exhibit material evidence documenting the history and development of national cultural heritage.
The fundamentals of the museum were laid in 1893 by the Muzeálna slovenská spoločnosť / Museum Slovak Society, which was founded thanks to the effort of Andrej Kmeť, who is regarded as the founder of the SNM.
