The festival “Museum Night” in 2020 will be held on May 18. For the convenience of visitors, the date can be rescheduled for a day off, namely for the night from Saturday to Sunday. Then museums and many other institutions, both municipal and private, will open the doors for everyone and provide an opportunity to get acquainted with the exhibitions for free.
The essence of the holiday
“Museum Night” is a festival held simultaneously in 42 countries of Europe and America. Since it is celebrated in the dark and you do not need to pay for visiting it, people with any level of income can visit the holiday. Work, study or any daytime activities will not interfere. A nice bonus is the permission to take photos and videos. The action is held with the aim of preserving museum values, as well as attracting the interest of people of all ages to history and culture. On a holiday date, institutions supplement their usual list of services, for example, with a flash mob or a unique tour, and prepare a special program.
By tradition, popular museums, art galleries and estates take part in the action. Most of them are usually located in the city center. This makes it possible to visit many places in a short time.
Story
The idea of celebrating “Museum Nights” originated in Europe in the 1970s. There, on certain days of May, museums worked completely free of charge. Then the celebration was called a little differently “Spring of museums”. The holiday with a modern name was first celebrated in the German capital in 1997 on the last weekend of January. It was an overwhelming success and went down in history as the “Long Night of Museums”. In 1998, not only Berlin, but also 20 German cities became participants in the festival. Gradually, “Museum Night” began to be celebrated in all European capitals. For example, in Paris, the inhabitants of France and its guests were able to join the idea of the holiday since 2001.
A little later, each year they began to ask a certain topic. So in “Museum Night”, visitors could observe topics: “History and Stories”, “Masterpieces from the storerooms”, “Memory”, etc. According to statistics, in 2003, the Australian collection of Liechtenstein Hans Adam II was very popular, and in 2004, 22,000 people came to look at the history of the Cathedral in Berlin.
The holiday received its official name only in 2005. Then France put forward a proposal to make this festival international. The Council of Europe approved this idea. Since then, the stock has been under his control. In 2006, the event was celebrated in 38 countries. It was attended by more than 2,000 institutions.
In Russia
In Russia, the holiday was first held in the city of Krasnoyarsk. It was dedicated to the 15th anniversary of the Krasnoyarsk Museum Center. The event was a huge success and was attended by 5,000 people. After the official approval, Moscow decided to support the action. In 2007, 10 city and federal institutions worked in it until 21:00. In 2008, many other cultural representatives joined them.
In the same year, St. Petersburg joined the international action. Then 33 museums and exhibition halls participated in the celebration. They were visited by 24,000 people. Every year the number of institutions and cities of Russia supporting the festival is growing. The “Museum Night” in 2020 promises to be even more ambitious and spectacular than in the previous one.
In 2011, 159 museums supported the action in the capital, and in Yekaterinburg the festival “European Museum Night in Yekaterinburg 2011” was attended by about 70,000 people.
In Moscow
The official time of the celebration in the Russian capital is from 18:00 to 00:00, but some institutions work until 02:00 and even 06:00. The date of the event falls on the third weekend of May. Almost everywhere, admission is free. The exception is only a few 
Among the institutions that participate in the action are:
- Museum-Estate “Tsaritsyno”;
- The Moscow Kremlin;
- Darwin Museum;
- Moskvarium;
- Moscow Puppet Theater;
- Soyuzmultfilm Film Studio;
- Tretyakov Gallery, etc.
Just one night in Moscow gives you the opportunity to see for free the current trends in art, historical monuments and visit unusual exhibitions. In addition to traditional expositions, each institution in the capital prepares a special program for the holiday, which may include:
- master classes;
- lectures;
- quests;
- art projects;
- film screenings and much more.
The holiday covers not only museums, but also many other objects in Moscow. In estates and parks you can watch various performances and events. For animal lovers, the Moscow Zoo works, and for connoisseurs of classics, classical music concerts are held at metro stations.
In 2010, embassies attended the event. Greek, French, Belgian representatives talked about the features of their work and conducted tours of the embassy buildings.
In St. Petersburg
According to official figures, in 2018, about 100,000 people took part in the holiday in the northern capital of Russia.
During the festival in St. Petersburg you can visit:
- Artillery Museum;
- Botanical Garden;
- Saint Isaac's Cathedral;
- Comic book library
- TsPKiO named after S.M. Kirov
- Baltic house;
- Pushkin House;
- Great Hall of the Philharmonic D.D. Shostakovich;
- Zoo etc.
Institutions located in the center are convenient to visit, as they are located next to each other. For some selected places, it is necessary to take into account the schedule of bridges. On the day of the holiday, special sightseeing buses and additional vehicles are launched on routes leading to museums and estates.
When the “Museum Night” will be celebrated, then every resident of Russia will have a wonderful opportunity to join the cultural life at the same time as other residents of different countries of the world. Unfortunately, you won’t be able to see everything at once on one May night of 2020, so everyone can choose only the most interesting for themselves.
Museum night or online tour of world-famous museums: video
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