Lapidarium Museum & Rigo Gallery

 

Lapidarium Museum & Rigo Gallery

Istria’s first purpose-built and design museum (since 2006) is the best practice example of how to successfully site contemporary architecture within the context of an old town. The Lapidarium contains a permanent collection of archaeological remains – mostly pre-Romanesque stone works from Novigrad ex-cathedral. The fragments of the inventory are stunning, featuring delicately carved intertwining patterns, familiar Christian symbols, and an array of animals and mythical beasts. Special attention attracts the Mauricio ciborium, one of the rare entirely preserved early medieval ciborium in Europe.

 

With a permanent collection alongside are challenging multimedia and interdisciplinary cultural events throughout the year. The events cover different historical periods, immediate past and those that accompany our everyday life. There are usually major summer exhibitions featuring a leading Croatian or international artists, and frequent contemporary art happenings as the International Festival of Visual Arts ARTerIja. 

 

 

Part of Museum is the Rigo Gallery (Velika ulica 9), former small exhibition place for the collection Lapidarium (till 1995). Today Gallery Rigo is well known in Croatia and worldwide, it has a fast-moving program of challenging contemporary art exhibitions.