What I can see

In this museum, we can admire the evolution of traditional art through everyday objects, utensils and tools. More specifically, there are two main categories of collections: a) museum objects (folk costumes, textiles, embroidery, works of silver and goldsmithing, metalwork, woodcarving, ceramics, paintings, musical instruments and photographs), b) archival material (proverbs, songs, musical material from all over Greece, unpublished works, archive of clippings, the Stilpon Kyriakides archive and the documentary film about the Anastenarides from Agia Eleni, Serres). The museum is located in a historic building, which -during Ottoman times- housed the Idadiye School for the training of Ottoman civil servants and was designed by Vitaliano Poselli. It has many neoclassical elements, the most important of which is the pedimented central section of the main facade. The spaces are developed around a central atrium and each floor has a perimeter corridor.

What I can't see

The objects were saved during WWII and after the war, the collections were enriched thanks to tireless people of the university and the museum. Until her death, Alki Kyriakidou-Nestoros was in charge of photographing most of the objects and their categorization into thematic groups (e.g. traditional crops). The digitization is a project that continues to this day.

Info

• Address: Ethninis Amynis St., Aristotle University of Thessaloniki

Bibliography