Arcos is the first contemporary art showcase in Sannio. Placed inside the recovered undergrounds of Prefecture Palace, ARCOS is a place for culture promotion, didactic lab, art fabric, meeting and research point. The museum, with its inaugural exhibition in 2005 “Moon…the night awakens the imagination”- a homage to the last forty years of Italian contemporary art- housed other shows: “Approaching reality borders. Art, science and technology”, “Once upon a time there was a king. The contemporary fable”, La città che sale. We try to build the future” and “Les fleurs du mal”.
Arcos has a bookshop, a library and a cafeteria. The wide spaces are dedicated to temporary exhibitions and the acquisition of a permanent collection. The research activity is focused on seminars and conferences with artists, curators, collectors. Thanks to these activities and to the scientific direction of Prof. Danilo Eccher, ARCOS has gained itself a status as a growing meeting point between the national and international contemporary art dimensions, laying the foundations for becoming an important point of reference for the international contemporary art scenario.
Arcos educational
The didactic project is bent to contemporary art divulgation through a new and formative approach that draw up different ages. The routes include guided tours where spectators turn into itinerary protagonists. Labs change according to the exhibitions for a better comprehension the art works inside the museum.
The main idea develops around a constant frequency of the museum as an “art fabric”, culture place, research and documentation. The programme offers a support to the fruition of every temporary exhibition. The museum carries out different activities that give various ways to come near a museum reality unique in its genre.
Arcos housed::
“When beauty shone,theatrical inspired to the exhibition “Les fleurs du mal”- opened on the 6th November 2007;
“In connection/museum” meeting-debate with Achille Bonito Oliva in December 2006;
“Atelier. Once upon a time there was a museum", show/guide inspired to the exhibition “Once upon a time there was a king. The contemporary fable” opened on the 25th October 2006.
Information
Musa, Agricultural techniques and labour museum, è it’s a structure that looks at the recent past and at this territory cultural identity. This museum is a real cultural promotion centre for agricultural history and agrarian technologies: its purpose is to save from oblivion not only elements linked to man’s productive capabilities but also to his history, culture, civil and moral values matured within the field of agricultural production. The history of the machines, the inventors, the restorers and the stories from domestic and rural life, constitute MUSA’s soul and rotate around a complex and fascinating exposition of period tractors. Machines, inventors, restorers, domestic lives stories document technical evolution, social, economical and cultural transformations that tractors have brought to rural areas and in all our lives. At the moment the museum is a dynamic cultural pole where take place guided tours, events, fairs, conferences, meetings and concerts.
Information
Meg, Solopaca Oenogastronomic Museum, is dedicated to food and flavours, a very important part of our culture. An extraordinary collection of food product labels from the end of the XIX century to modern times, with some exhibits of noteworthy rarity and originality, makes the Meg an important pole for food and wine didactics.
Placed inside Cutillo Palace, historical edifice built in 1826 in the city centre, Meg houses a didactic route dedicated to oeno-gastronomy, its history and to scientific studies linked to food products. The visitor can search in the relationship between art and oeno-gastronomic production, through the observation of packaging labels; in fact its collection presents the historical-artistic evolution of food design.
The didactic route shows the development of new illegality forms in the food production. Thanks to this information the visitor will be conscious of the situation and be able to protect himself. MEG focues through videos and fitting-out ad hoc the relationship between food and health aiming at divulging info on food and customers well-being. Nowadays, the museum is a cultural holder and a dialogue place between scientific culture and citizens, where take place guided tours, events, conferences, meetings and concerts.
Information
Provincial Administration of Benevento, Ministry for Cultural Heritage, Salerno, Avellino and Benevento Superintendency for archaeological heritage, Campania Region and Pietraroja Municipality strongly promoted and wanted it. The museum combines scientific rigour with ability in spreading giving information about the area geologic history and its “ancient inhabitants”, nowadays fossils.
The Institute was opened on the 10th April 2005 and offers the possibility to go on a real journey till the oldest time with interactive experiences: the geological lift, didactic labs and 3D projection room. The story Paleo-lab “tells” is strictly linked to Italy and Apennines’ birth. Three interactive exhibitions illustrate the main earth geodynamical mechanisms that are the background of local geological phenomena: from plate tectonics to continental drift, till volcanoes distribution and earthquakes.
The museum now houses “Scipionyx Samniticus” (known as “Ciro”), the first dinosaur cub found in Italy that comes to us from nearly 110 million years ago and it’s an unprecedented case among dinosaur’s fossils because it presents parts of muscles in the back and at the base of the tail, as well as a perfectly preserved intestine. The sensational discovery gained a relevant place in Palaeonthology treatises and was also published on the scientific magazine Nature.
Information
Samnium museum proposes itself as a starting point to visit the fascinating city and province territory This museum, founded in 1873 by the Provincial Council of Benevento and located in Santa Sofia Abbey, contains a rich historical, artistic and archaeological patrimony. An important archaeological section presents Greek and Italic finds, Egyptian and Roman statues and materials dating back to the prehistoric period. There are weapons and everyday life objects discovered in the Longobard sepulchres near Benevento. A unicum is dedicated to exhibits uncovered in Benevento’s Egyptian Sanctuaries: the Isis Hall displays holy artefacts from the Temple of Isis “the Lady of Benevento”, currently the most considerable nucleus of Egyptian and Neo-Egyptian sculptures ever uncovered outside of Egypt.
SAINT ILARIO’S CHURCH
There are assured documentary sources about Saint Ilario from XII century, even if recent excavations have place the construction at VII-VIII century A.C. Known as Sant’Ilario a Port’Aurea(Golden Door) because it was built near Traiano Arch that became first entrance door for the city, the church has an apse and two spans covered by domes. Nowadays, over one thousand and two hundred years from its foundation, Sant’Ilario a Port’Aurea church isn’t any more a simple monument, but it is an innovative museum site. Its walls house a multimedia projection: “The Arch Tales” that tell Emperor Traiano’s military exploits and the political program. Thanks to a small piece of magic come into view: Plinio the young, author of a panegyric on the Emperor, Critone, prince personal doctor and finally Traiano. It’ll be a fascinating experience.
Information
GeoBioLab LEN, Naturalness European Lab, is the first museum dedicated to science in Benevento. The visitor through an original didactic route approaches science in a different way; the didactic route, in fact, unites scientific research and playful activity, linking virtual reality, 3-dimensional film, photos, scenographic reconstructions, exhibits, “talking” machines. The museum, curated by the physician Paco Lanciano, follows a philosophy suitable for primary school children. The visitor should do some researches on Planet Earth, especially on a small part of it, Sannio.
