MUSEUMS COSTA RICA
Museo de Oro Precolombino
The Museo de Oro Precolombino or Museum of Precolumbian gold Museum is located under the Plaza de la Cultura in downtown San Jose. The impressive underground building that houses the exhibit creates a mysterious and dark background for the gleaming beauty of the golden pieces, which seem to float because they're suspended by transparent strings. These indigenous jewels depict numerous animals- frogs, birds, snakes, insects, crocodiles, lobsters and even sharks.
Museo de Jade
It's located in the INS building in downtown (in the National Insurance building). The amazing quantities and the quality of the jade in the country can only be attributed to trade, since the country lacks jade mines. The exhibit in this museum is the largest American jade collection in the world. The collection is extremely valuable because of the rarity of the mineral and of the religious and historical significance that it has for the Indian population and for the Costa Ricans in general.
Museo Nacional
Museo Nacional is located in an old fort, which was marked by bullet holes during the 1948 Civil War. The archaeological room offers several Indian artifacts made of stone and clay, like pottery. The colonial room presents facts about the conquest and also some examples of religious art brought by the Spaniards. Another section of the Museum is dedicated to current exhibits.
Museo de Arte Costarricense
The Museo de Arte Costarricense is located in the Sabana urban park, in a beautiful building that was the old international airport. The gorgeous architecture of the building doesn't detract from the fine paintings and sculptures that are on exhibit. Some of the finest Costa Rican art is present in this collection.
Museo de Arte Contemporaneo
The Museo de arte contemporaneo (contemporary art), is located in what used to be the National Liquor factory. This sounds very strange, but believe me, the once industrial place has turned into a very artistic and graceful set of buildings and surrounding grounds. Some exhibits vary all the time, and the small and medium-sized auditoriums offer dance and theater presentations.
Museo de Ciencias Naturales
Museo de Ciencias Naturales La Salle (Natural science) is located in La Sabana, and it presents a taxidermy collection of various animals and a preserved fish and reptile exhibit. It displays a large collection of stuffed animals and mounted butterflies. It is a resource for people that like to identify some species they have seen in the wild. There are also exhibits on palaeontology and archaeology.
Entomology Museum in the University of Costa Rica.
Entomology Museum in the University of Costa Rica. The small university museum (located for some weird reason in the basement of the Music School) contains a large collection of insects of Central and South America, including beautiful butterflies. The admission is free in this museum, but the hours are pretty irregular.
Children's Museum
The Museo de Los Niņos (Children's Museum) of Costa Rica was not just the first of its kind in Central America, but its location was specifically chosen to send a message. By taking the old military prison and turning it into an interactive and educational experience for its children, Costa Rica was sending the message that the future of this tiny country was not going to be that of bloodshed and strife. Instead, its future would be the education and care of its children.
|
|
|
