Our Underrated Cultural Wealth

The Ukrainian capital recently played host to some guests of honor from Poland and Sweden. These were museum directors who have received awards for popularizing the Ukrainian historical heritage and implementing international cooperation in the museum sector. The guests visited the Ukrainian National History Museum, the Ethnographic Museum of Pyrohiv, and the world-famous St. Sophia Cathedral. Their visit, and particularly the fact that they brought Bohdan Khmelnytsky’s flag to Ukraine, served to heighten the public’s interest in national history, as many Ukrainians rushed out to see the exhibit or call for reservations. Everyone wanted to see the celebrated Ukrainian hetman’s insignia and personal effects on display, courtesy of foreign museums. The historical treasures that were brought to Ukraine are not open to the general public yet. It is expected that they will be displayed during the inauguration ceremony and will then be available for public viewing at the museum. But even then public access will be limited, considering that a thousand people walking past the displayed items will affect the required humidity and temperature levels. Moreover, the Ukrainian hetman’s standard must be kept in an upright position and at an angle of 45 degrees. Do our museums meet international standards? Nina Kovtaniuk, deputy director of the Ukrainian National History Museum, says that museums abroad are usually located on old historic grounds or specially designed and equipped premises, in accordance with universal museum standards: “Our museum occupies premises that date back to 1937, when it was an art school. Its main feature is all those large windows, because paintings require a lot of light. Yet this very feature is damaging to our exhibits, so we have several layers of curtains on the windows. Also, to make the items on display look good we have to use top-notch glass display cases. The various types of glass made in Ukraine are no good, as they are often overfired in the kiln and the resulting product lacks smoothness and transparency. Foreign-made glass is too expensive (one pane of glass costs over 3,000 hryvnias).

According to Nina Kovtaniuk, people are becoming more interested in history: “I’ve been with this museum since 1967. Under the Soviets we mostly had group excursions ordered ahead of time, with visitors often arriving by the trainload. At present, we have mostly theme-oriented guided tours and we are seeing many more individual visitors. The most popular themes are the Cossack and Old Rus’ periods, and children are mostly interested in the prehistoric period. Grownups mostly explain later periods of Ukrainian history to children.”

A family admission fee (four persons) is 10.5 hryvnias and a single ticket costs six hryvnias. Pensioners and students pay only three hryvnias. A ticket to the museum’s Historical Gems Division costs twice as much, which is approximately in keeping with international standards. According to our guests, a single ticket costs roughly two US dollars. The Swedish Consul in Ukraine, Jon-Krister Olander told The Day that Sweden’s policy is aimed at setting up the largest possible network of free museums. He admitted that exploring museums in Sweden is a rather expensive pastime (the average admission fee is two euros). He also believes that museums should have longer visiting hours in the evening, when people have ended their workday. Jochan Engstrema, director of the Royal Army Museum in Stockholm, says that it is very difficult to obtain employment in museums in his country because the competition is heavy and the number of vacancies limited. The most popular museums in Sweden are those that are devoted to art, history, and the development of technology. “Sweden doesn’t have large museum collections, but there are a lot of richly endowed, state-of-the-art museums. Swedish experts on Ukrainian museum artifacts are mostly attracted by all those Scythian gold artifacts that are perfect objets d’art. According to Mr. Olander, the average Swedish citizen associates Ukraine with the pop singer Ruslana, Ukrainian sport, and the history of Cossackdom and Kyivan Rus’.

Zofia Golubiew, curator of Krakow’s National Museum, said she is very happy to be organizing an exhibit of artifacts from Odesa’s Museum of Archaeology, which is planned for this autumn. She hopes the Ukrainian side will assist with the deliveries of artifacts. Various museum exhibits, especially those dealing with painting and the other arts, are extremely popular in Poland. Even though her museum has national status and is financed by the state, there aren’t enough funds to develop the museum and organize exhibits. Seventy percent of the budget is spent on the museum’s payroll, while remaining funds are eaten up by municipal payments. So the museum is forced to look around for sponsors. Even though the average Pole must strain the family budget to explore Polish museums — seven zloty for an adult visitor (slightly over $2.00) and three zloty for children and teens — this doesn’t produce much revenue for museums. In the case of Krakow’s National Museum, there are fifteen buildings to maintain, 800,000 exhibits to store, and 850 people on the museum’s payroll.

Like her colleagues who recently visited Ukraine, Ms. Golubiew calls the “Scythian Gold” exhibit a unique collection of jewelry that was fashioned on the territory of our country in deepest antiquity.

The largest collection is showcased at the Historical Gems Division of the Ukrainian National History Museum, located on the grounds of the Kyivan Cave Monastery. Liubov Klochko, the division’s academic secretary, acknowledges that apart from their great artistic value, the items on display represent an amalgam of several national cultures that once thrived on the territory of Ukraine. They tell remarkable stories about how people lived in this period, and help create a portrait of individual historical figures. In Soviet times, people obtained access to this museum only by making reservations and having to stand in long lines. Today there are no such problems; visitors begin their tour as soon as a group is filled. People have to wait, but the waiting period varies. People in the know say that there is not enough publicity. Or perhaps Ukrainians simply don’t realize that they represent a large and accomplished nation.