logo_eng
A+ R A-

Museum of Marble Crafts of Tinos

E-mail Print PDF

piop_logo_en

 

Myrtis's journey… in the Thematic Museums Network of P.I.O.P.

 

Since Myrtis’ first presentation in the New Acropolis Museum, in April 2010, the exhibition “Myrtis: Face to Face with the Past” has visited the Goulandris Natural History Museum, the National Archaeological Museum, the Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki and the Museum of the City of Podgoritsa in Montenegro, and today it is exhibited in the Museum of Marble Crafts in Tinos. It is the sixth of the Thematic Museums Network of the Piraeus Group Cultural Foundation.

The cooperation of the Myrtis’ research team with the Thematic Museums Network of P.I.O.P. signals the start of Myrtis’ exhibition in not only archaeological museums but in “thematic” ones, as are those of P.I.O.P.

Moreover, this cooperation gave us the opportunity to present the exhibition in two different museums, at the same period in the same city. The enterprise will materialize in the city of Volos, in October 2011, and the museums that will participate are the Rofftile and Brickworks Museum N. & S. Tsalapatas and the Archaeological Museum of Volos.

We believe that the joint action of these two museums will open new museological prospects that will ensue from the cooperation of the private sector –with the thematic museums– with the public sector and the archaeological museums.

 

piop_map_2011_l

 

 

 

piop_logo_marmarotexnias_en

 

The Museum of Marble Crafts in Pirgos, on the island of Tinos, was created by the Piraeus Bank Group Cultural Foundation (PIOP), which is also responsible for running it. It belongs to the Foundation's Network of Thematic Museums and is the first of its kind in Greece. The museum is housed in modern, fully equipped installations that include a multipurpose hall and which were built so as to tie in harmoniously with the island's characteristic landscape. Included in the 2000-2006 Regional Operational Programme of the Southern Aegean, the project was financed by the Third Community Support Framework, as well as by the Piraeus Bank.

The museum presents the technology of marble, a material with a particular place in the architecture and art of Greece, from ancient times to the present. At the same time, the intricate meshing of tools and techniques is described in detail. In parallel to the above, the emphasis given to the pre-industrial and proto-industrial periods in Tinos, the most important centre of marble crafts in Modern Greece, brings to the fore the social and economic context in which the local workshops evolved.

The permanent exhibition comprises a variety of original works in marble: mundane, ecclesiastical, funerary and everyday objects (door lintels, fountains, family crests, corbels, shrines, mortars, etc.), clay models and plaster-of-Paris copies, as well as quarrying, cutting and carving tools, mechanical equipment, archival material and the richest collection of sketches of old marble carvings of the whole of Greece. This impressive number of authentic objects was collected essentially thanks to people's sensitization, but also that of public entities, who donated or bequeathed them to PIOP. Moreover, in combination with the representations of a quarry, of a marble? craft workshop and of the assembling of a bishop's throne, visitors have the opportunity of familiarizing themselves with traditional techniques and processes regarding the quarrying, initial hewing and transportation of marble, as well as those concerning the shaping and positioning of a work in marble, thus following the entire trajectory from the raw material to the finished article. At the same time, the exhibition's audiovisual material brings to life the traditional working methods of the quarryman and the marble craftsman, while the travelogue's photographs record the intense presence of marble across the width and breadth of Tinos and incites visitors to go on their discovery missions of the island. Finally, the exhibition extends into the museum's outdoor areas. In the square in front of the museum's entrance, a hoisting machine for blocks of marble and a trolley for their transportation from the quarry of Vathi are on show, while on the balcony a wagon-truck for chippings and rubble, a bend corner and rails from the quarry of Patela are exhibited, together with finished and in-process marble works. The historical mechanical equipment presented in the outdoor exhibition was salvaged, repaired and restored to function by PIOP and reconstructs typical images of the corresponding in situ working environments.


www.piop.gr, This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

 

piop_tinos_1_lpiop_tinos_2_lpiop_tinos_3_l