Georgian National Museum's digital tours replace physical visits
Items of the Oriental collections of the network as seen through its digital tour. Screenshot of Georgian National Museum Virtual Tour.
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While exhibition spaces and cultural institutions shut down across Georgia over the last week as a measure against the new coronavirus, the Georgian National Museum has made available digital tours of its collections to museum-goers staying at home.
The decision sees the GNM, a network of state museums across Georgia, follow a string of venues around the world that have moved to open their spaces to internet users while lockdowns and measures for working from home are in place.
The umbrella organisation for the network said on Tuesday it was launching Museum Virtual Tour, its online platform bringing archaeological items, artwork, biodiversity exhibits and other collections to the web.
A view of archaeological exhibits found in one of seven digital tours launched online by the GNM. Screenshot of Georgian National Museum Virtual Tour.
Seven themed collections, found in various GNM venues and spaces, have been picked to become part of the digital expositions:
- Archaeological, numismatic and Medieval treasures
- Georgian archaeology between the 80th century BCE-4th century CE
- Stone Age Georgia
- Caucasus biodiversity
- Georgian costumes and weapons between the 18th-20th centuries
- Oriental collections of India, China and Japan
- Exhibition of the Soviet Occupation
Subjects covered by the selections include "unique" examples of goldsmithery and the history of money on the historical territory of the country, the museum network said.
Georgia's rich winemaking legacy and remains from the 1991 Dmanisi site discovery of the then-earliest human fossils found outside the African continent are also found in the tours.
By selecting the exhibitions users are able to use 360-degree navigation through venues and discover items as they are found in related museums.
The GNM also announced it would provide updates to its social media channels to complement the new digital explorations of historical items.
Tbilisi will become the first location outside Italy to host a display of digital reproductions of works by Leonardo da Vinci next week, to mark 500 years since the death of the Italian Renaissance painter, architect and inventor.
A Georgian National Museum display will bring fresh findings on neanderthals in the South Caucasus from the Tsutskhvati Cave archaeological site to viewers in the capital starting this Saturday.
The Eurasan Otter, Nordman's Apollo butterfly and Colchian Sowbread flower are among the flora and fauna found across the South Caucasus and now discoverable on the first online map of the region's biodiversity.
A first-ever illustrated map of biodiversity across the South Caucasus region will be presented to the public at the Museum of Georgia this Saturday.
Some of the most unique and endangered species of the Caucasian flora, fauna and geology will be in touching distance for museum-goers in Tbilisi in a new display starting today.
Radio channels across Georgia will join their European counterparts in bringing encouragement to those staying at home or battling the coronavirus outbreak by playing the same song throughout the continent at the same time on Friday.
Cinephiles staying at home as a safety measure from the new coronavirus can make their isolation more entertaining through a newly available selection of short films, made viewable online by 20 Steps production studio.
Cinema production studios and the Georgian National Film Centre have made over a dozen contemporary films available for viewing for free online, in a move aimed at cheering up those in social isolation from COVID-19 risks.
As the physical art scenes remain in shutdown due to the new coronavirus outbreak, works by 30 Georgian creatives explore the "new reality" in a digital group show available in videogame form on the internet.
With various sectors of economic activity and socialising reopening in Georgia following the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the culture and health ministries have now published guidelines for cultural and artistic organisations to prepare their spaces for hosting audiences again in the near future.
Culture institutions and projects run in Georgia's capital will start benefiting from an increased financial support from the Tbilisi City Hall, mayor Kakha Kaladze said on Wednesday.
Over the next week, venues of the Georgian National Museum network will open their doors to the public with an array of tours, book presentations, talks, displays and educational programmes to mark the latest Georgian National Museum Fest.
The German Archaeological Institute has gifted the Georgian National Museum a fabric made according to the pattern which dates back the 3rd millennium BCE, which was found in a Lagodekhi burial mound in the eastern Georgian region of Kakheti in 2012.
Archaeological riches discovered in western Georgia's Imereti province will find their place at the Vani Archaeological Museum, renovated for the first time in 35 years and unveiled this week.