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Study courses in the Staraya
Derevnya Restoration and Storage Center Course in Museum Affairs. The course was opened in April 2005 in the presence of Museum Director Mikhail Piotrovsky, Hermitage staff and staff from the main Faculties of Museum Affairs at St Petersburg institutions of higher learning. The basic task of the course is to bring together museum practices and museum theory in order to give future museum workers, historians and theoreticians of culture a chance to study their subject. The classroom is equipped with unique training stands, and it has a rich library on the history of art and on museum affairs. The stands which have been installed are devoted to security systems; they were prepared and donated to the State Hermitage by the company Argus Spectrum. At present the State Hermitage course is a practical work area for the Faculty of Museum Affairs and the Safeguarding of Monuments within the Department of Philosophy of the St Petersburg State University. This is where one can pursue studies of the theory and practice of museum operations, the fundamentals of museum security and the fundamentals of running a storage facility. Course on "The Past at Your Fingertips" The idea for creating this course was to give blind children and those with poor vision greater opportunities to enjoy a museum education. Over the course of many years the State Hermitage has brought in students from the K.K. Grot Boarding School N 1 and the Boarding School N 2, and has arranged special programs for them. The program entitled "The Past at Your Fingertips" was created by teachers from these schools and by staff from the Department of the Archeology of Eastern Europe and Siberia, the School Center, as well as staff from the Development Department and the engineering and financial services groups within the museum, from the Staraya Derevnya Restoration and Storage Center, and by artist Anatoly Belkin, plus many others who performed creative work. The launch of the course was assisted by support from the Club of American Friends of the Hermitage and by staff of the Lomonosov Porcelain Factory. The course uses specially made miniature landscapes from various historical ages: the Paleolithic, the Neolithic, the Bronze and Iron Ages, and the Early Middle Ages. The class is also equipped with unusual models of "cultural strata" which give the children the joy of making their own archeological discoveries. Among the "finds" are numerous replicas that were specially made by modern scholars and masters using genuine museum exhibits as their models. Among them are tools, arms, vessels, household utensils, elements of costumes, decorations and works of art. Each archeological period is represented by a large number of these replicas made from the same material as the originals (stone, metal, bone, clay, wood, amber, leather, textiles) as well as from imitations (plastic). During the first half of 2006 there are plans to approve a program for archeology, and work will proceed on drawing up a syllabus for the classes and preparing the methodology to be used in the studies. In this unique test regime, the program will be tried on several groups of students: pupils from the boarding schools for the blind and children with poor vision who are participating in the Hermitage study circles and the archeology study circles of the Palace of Creativity for the Young. Beginning in October 2006, a shift will be made to regular studies. Many pupils from around St Petersburg will be given the opportunity to study in the program. At the end of the first academic year of regular studies, there are plans to organize a round table for participants together with Russian and foreign specialists to discuss the initial results of the program. At present the "archeological issues" are being mastered; ahead there will be a presentation on the evolution of costumes and carriages, as well as many other themes for the educational program. |
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