History of The Museum
Art Museum of Estonia was founded on November 17, 1919, but it was not until 1921 that it got its first permanent building — the Kadriorg Palace, built in the 18th century. In 1929 the palace was expropriated from the Art Museum in order to rebuild it as the residence of the President of Estonia.
The Art Museum of Estonia was housed in several different temporary spaces, until it moved back to the palace in 1946. In September, 1991 the Kadriorg Palace was closed, because it was totally deteriorated by then. At the end of the year the Supreme Council of the Republic of Estonia decided to guarantee the construction of a new building for the Art Museum of Estonia in Kadriorg. Until then the Estonian Knighthood House at Toompea Hill served as the temporary main building of the Art Museum of Estonia. The exhibition there was opened on April 1, 1993. Art Museum of Estonia permanently closed down the exhibitions in that building in October 2005.
At the end of the 1970s, in the 1980s the first branches of the Art Museum of Estonia were founded. Starting in 1995, all of the branches offer different educational programmes for children and young people. In 1996 the exhibition hall on the first floor of Rotermann Salt Storage was opened; this branch was closed in May 2005. In the summer of 2000 the restored Kadriorg Palace was opened, but not as the main building of the Art Museum of Estonia, but as a branch. Kadriorg Art Museum now exhibits the foreign art collection of the Art Museum of Estonia.
At present there are four active branches of the Art Museum of Estonia: Kadriorg Art Museum (Kadriorg Palace and Mikkel Museum), Niguliste Museum, Adamson-Eric Museum, and Kumu Art Museum.
For the first time in its nearly 100-year-old history, the Art Museum of Estonia has a building that both meets the museum's requirements and is worthy of Estonian art in its collections. Kumu includes exhibition halls, an auditorium that offers diverse possibilities, and an education centre for children and art lovers.
Read more about this topic: Kumu (museum)
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