Notranjska Museum Postojna

The Notranjska Museum, Postojna, founded in 1947, covers the area of the Municipality of Postojna. With headquarters in Postojna and dislocated venues in Cerknica, Grahovo, and Predjama, it manages the rich Karst natural and cultural heritage. For decades the museum operated in an old mansion in the town centre, where Karst Research Institute is housed, then it moved to the old premises of Postojna garrison headquarters. In February 2015 The Karst Museum, a new permanent exhibition was set up. It is a part of the Museumcultour project funded under the IPA Adriatic Cross-Border Cooperation Programme.

History

The idea of establishing a museum in the Karst region goes back in time before World War I. Ivan Andrej Perko proposed an opening of the Scientific Cave Museum as early as 1912. The concept was realised only after World War II as the Postojna Cave Museum at the initiative of painter Leo Vilhar (1899–1971), who also became the first director (1947–1964), with headquarters in Postojna castle.

In 1974 following the merger of its speleological collections with those of the Slovene Academy of Sciences and Arts (SAZU) the museum became a part of the Karst Research Institute and changed its name to the Karst Museum Collection. Following the failure of efforts to found a Slovene Museum of Karstology in the 1980s, the Municipality of Postojna upgraded the Postojna Cave Museum to create the Notranjska Museum in 1990. After years at a temporary location, in May 2011 the museum moved to its new permanent headquarters in the former garrison commands at Kolodvorska 3 in Postojna, where a permanent exhibition was placed as well.

Mission

The Notranjska Museum collects and preserves movable cultural heritage and presents documents, photographs, maps and other interpretative materials relating to Postojna Cave and the surrounding Karst landscape. It organises different workshops and expert meetings relating to Karst topics. The conservation restoration workshop maintains the movable cultural heritage.

Venues

The museum administers various satellites, including the iron forge at Grahovo, Kravanjeva House in Cerknica, and it owns some museum items at the Predjama Castle. It also manages a small memorial room dedicated to local writer Alojz Kraigher (1877–1959) at Postojna Culture House, which can be visited by appointment.

Collections

The museum manages five collections: an archaeological collection of spelaean finds, bronze and iron age finds, and objects from the Roman period and mediaeval times; an ethnological collection of local handicraft items, farming tools and equipment, transport items, cave mural signatures, small festive buns, objects of spiritual culture, fishing collection, dormouse collection in a dairy farm of Snežnik Castle, blacksmith collection in the iron forge at Grahovo; a biological collection consisting of zoological, botanical, and osteological items and a collection of cave beetles from the Balkan peninsula collected by Egon Pretner (1896–1982); a history collection of documents, items from the National Liberation Struggle (NOB), old photographs and postcards, diplomas, leaflets and posters, items about the history of Postojna Cave, and items of relevance to cultural history; and the collection of Aeroklub Postojna – a collection of flying vintage aircraft by flight pioneer Edvard Rusjan (1886–1911).

Karst Museum

A new permanent exhition – The Karst Museum exhibition Postojna – was set up in February 2015.

Multimedia projects

In 2006 the museum cooperated together with the Institute for Conservation and Restoration in the multimedia project All Season Sounds of Planinsko polje to present the aural environment of Planinsko polje over a year.

External links

Notranjska Museum Postojna

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