MuCiv - Museo delle Civiltà

On September 2016, after a complex restoration and reorganization of the structures by the Ministero dei Beni e delle Attività Culturali e del Turismo, MuCiv - Museo delle Civiltà was born.

Its institution regroups five important sections: the Museo Nazionale Preistorico Etnografico Luigi Pigorini, the Museo Nazionale delle Arti e Tradizioni Popolari Lamberto Loria, the Museo Nazionale dell'Alto Medioevo Alessandra Vaccaro all located in the monumental part of the EUR district, the Museo Nazionale d'Arte Orientale Giuseppe Tucci which, from the historic headquarters of Palazzo Brancaccio in Via Merulana was transferred to the Eur in the Palazzo delle Scienze, and the Museo Italo Africano Ilaria Alpi. The establishment of this important place of culture intends to manage, enhance and promote in a unified and innovative way unique archaeological and ethnographic collections. With over 2,000,000 works and documents, distributed over approximately 50,000 square meters of exhibition rooms and storage areas in fact, the Museum of Civilizations includes several museums where the oldest finds of Italian museology are preserved, from prehistory to paleontology, from non-European arts and cultures to the testimonies of Italian colonial history, up to Italian popular arts and traditions.

The Museo Nazionale Preistorico Etnografico Luigi Pigorini, founded by the palethnologist Luigi Pigorini, with the aim of illustrating the prehistoric testimonies of Italy and those of the current populations, in order to compare the different stages of development of cultures, was inaugurated in 1876 in the Collegio Romano building; between 1962 and 1977 it was transferred to the current head office of the EUR district. In the new layout, inaugurated in 1994, the structure is organized into two sectors: one dedicated to Prehistory and one to Ethnography.

The Museo Nazionale delle Arti e Tradizioni Popolari Lamberto Loria, formed around the nucleus of the collection of Lamberto Loria, it was enriched with objects from all over Italy in 1911 for the Exhibition of Italian Ethnography, as part of the celebrations for the 50th anniversary of the Unity of Italy. The Museum preserves over one hundred thousand testimonies of traditional Italian culture, from the 16th to the 20th century, including around 700 regional costumes, over 4 thousand jewels, more than 6 thousand wooden artefacts including work tools and folk crafts and about 5 thousand ceramics.

The Museo Nazionale dell'Alto Medioevo Alessandra Vaccaro was inaugurated in 1967. It displays finds coming mainly from Roman contexts and from central Italy and ranging from the late-ancient period to the early Middle Ages. Funerary objects, marble furnishings from Lazio churches and ceramic materials recovered in the area of the Roman Forum.

The Museo Nazionale d'Arte Orientale Giuseppe Tucci, established in 1957 and inaugurated the following year, thanks to an agreement between the Ministero della Pubblica Istruzione and the former IsMEO (Italian Institute for the Middle and Far East), today IsIAO (Italian Institute for Africa and the 'Oriente), which granted its collections. The permanent exhibition is divided into the following sections: Ancient Near and Middle East, India, Gandhara, Tibet and Nepal, Southeast Asia and the Far East. 

The Museo Italo Africano Ilaria Alpi, the collection of the former Colonial Museum of Rome, born in 1923 to make Italian colonial "feats" known, grew until the beginning of the Second World War. Passed to the Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Activities in 2017, the collection currently includes 12,000 objects -  ethnographic, historical, artistic, anthropological, archaeological, and architectural, connected to natural sciences and geographical explorations - collected or created during the Italian military and colonial experience in Africa. The exhibition path is currently in phase of planning.

Since October 2022, under the direction of Andrea Viliani, the Museum of Civilizations of Rome has launched new research, archiving, cataloging and digitization paths, to share new knowledge with the public and other Italian national museums. In the context of the new layout of the prehistoric collections, for example, the Prehistory? Stories from the Anthropocene outlines an itinerary that raises questions about the very definition of "prehistory", a period characterized by material evidence that refers us to multiple systems of thought, cultural inventions, economic organizations and social policies. Here is a selection of objects including the Neanderthal skull Guattari 1 from Circeo, the three "Venus" from the sites of Savignano, Lago Trasimeno and La Marmotta, and the pirogues recovered from the bottom of Lake Bracciano together with hundreds of finds from the neolithic village of La Marmotta. The section concludes with the first chapter of an imaginative omination, drawn by the artist and graphic designer Goda Budvytytėe and the nanotechnology scholar Laura Tripaldi to outline the possible developments of evolution. The section also features interventions by two contemporary artists: the Lebanese Ali Cherri, recent winner of the Silver Lion at the Venice Biennale whose film The Digger is introduced into the Museum of Civilizations' collection, and the artist and anthropologist Elizabeth A. Povinelli, member of the indigenous Australian collective Karrabing Film & Art Collective. Furthermore, the two new symmetrical entrances to the Museum of Civilizations are inaugurated: the one already operational in the Palazzo delle Scienze and that of the Palazzo delle Arti e Tradizioni Populari, reopened after a restoration of the area on the ground floor of the building. Both entrances are redefined as a historical and critical introduction to the museum, almost a sort of narrative of the institution over time.

Furthermore, on the first floor of the Palazzo delle Scienze, the exhibition by Georges Senga Comment un petit chasseur païen devient Prêtre Catholique was inaugurated, curated by Lucrezia Cippitelli, which for the first time presents the photographic and filmic works and materials of the archive of research and products by the Congolese artist on the figure of Bonaventure Salumu, a "pagan hunter" who between the 40s and 60s of the twentieth century, after receiving a Christian education from some missionaries, was ordained a Jesuit priest, moved in Europe for a certain period to finally return to his native village, where he becomes a father. 

The museum complex will be accessed via two new symmetrical entrances. The one already operational, in the Palazzo delle Scienze, is joined by that of the Palazzo delle Arti e Tradizioni Populari, reopened after an overall restoration of the area on the ground floor of the building. In addition to hosting common services, they offer a historical and critical introduction to the museum, that is, a story of the institution over time.

A centre for research and experimentation, the institution welcomes six Research Fellowships, featuring international artists. Nucleus of their work are archives and museum collections, including those in storage, which can inspire exhibition projects, new works, publications, seminars, pedagogical activities or further outcomes.

Notes: starting
-from June 26, 2024 (area adjacent to the Giulio Rosso stained-glass window)
-from July 9, 2024 (current galleries of the Asian Arts and Cultures Collections)
-from July 16, 2024 (areas of the sub-porticos around the monumental staircase)
-and until the works are completed, access to the above areas and galleries will be temporarily suspended to allow for their ongoing renovation.

The area adjacent to the Giulio Rosso stained-glass window and the areas of the sub-porticos will be reopened in conjunction with the inauguration of the new EUR-Asia exhibition, scheduled for the end of summer 2024. The other galleries will remain closed to allow for plant upgrades and the subsequent expansion of the current American Arts and Cultures Collections‘s exhibition path, scheduled to open in early 2025.