Museum of Cultures, Ethnographic museum in Lugano, Switzerland
The Museum of Cultures occupies Villa Malpensata and displays collections of ethnographic works, oriental objects, and historical photographs across several exhibition spaces. The rooms present pieces from different parts of Asia and the Pacific region side by side.
The institution was founded in 1989 based on Serge Brignoni's collection of artworks from the Far East, India, Southeast Asia, and Oceania. This created a place to make these works publicly accessible.
The museum's name changed from Museum of Extra-European Cultures to Museo delle Culture in 2007 and to MUSEC in 2017. The Brignoni collection, gathered between 1930 and the mid-1980s, shows how avant-garde artists drew on the forms of South Seas objects. Temporary exhibitions occupy spaces such as Spazio Maraini, dedicated to travel photography and the theme of the exotic.
Access is possible both from Via Mazzini and from Riva Caccia. The Spazio Tesoro, at the museum entrance, is freely accessible and follows a periodically renewed route through works from the Brignoni collection and other holdings. Visits to the storage rooms and guided tours of the villa are available by prior reservation.
The museum preserves a digitized collection of hand-painted Japanese photographs from the 1800s, a technique rarely found elsewhere. These images showcase artistic methods that are seldom practiced today.
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