News

Tuesday 12 October 2021

The Online Museum of N.N. Miklouho-Maclay Was Presented at the International Convention

 
The opening ceremony of the Maclay Coast festival and the presentation of the first in Russia multimedia online museum of N.N. Miklouho-Maclay was held on the 12th of October, 2021 with the participation of Alikber Alikberov, the director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

The event was timed to the 175th anniversary of the outstanding Russian scientist and traveler N.N. Miklouho-Maclay and the 45th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Russia and Papua New Guinea.

The event brought together guests from the different countries in the scientific, cultural, educational, and socio-political spheres.

Lyudmila Vorobyova, the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Russian Federation to the Independent State of Papua New Guinea (concurrently), addressed the guests with a welcoming speech. She noted that this Festival would give a new impetus of humanitarian contacts development between the two countries.

James Marape, the Prime Minister of the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, also gave a speech at the event. He expressed his readiness to cooperate and to visit Russia at the invitation of Mikhail Mishustin, the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation. The invitation was received at the APEC summit in Papua New Guinea in 2018. Mr. Marape drew attention to the fact that N.N. Miklouho-Maclay Jr. was the representative of Papua New Guinea in Russia. Then he noted Mr.Maclay’s noted contribution to the friendship of the two counties' peoples, the preservation and popularization of the island state traditions and culture in the world.

The representatives of the Committees of St. Petersburg, the Honorary Consul of Australia in St. Petersburg, representatives of scientific, educational and government institutions were among the guests of honor at the convention.

Nikolai Miklouho-Maclay, the Head of the Center for the Study of the South Pacific Region, Research Fellow at the Center for Southeast Asia, Australia and Oceania, (the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences), the President of the Association of South Pacific Researchers, the Head and Founder of the Miklouho-Maclay Foundation noted in his greeting that the online museum of N.N. Miklouho-Maclay exhibited unique exhibits of high historical and cultural value. Mr. Maclay added that these finds had been collected during the research expeditions to the northeast of the island New Guinea.  Then he said that these materials were prepared as a result of many years of work and revealed the region's exploration by fearless scientist Miklukho-Maclay, and his 175th anniversary we were celebrating this year.

According to Mr. Maclay, these projects were extremely important and relevant. They provided an opportunity to touch the history of domestic research in the South Seas region, enrich oneself with knowledge of our compatriots achievements, and to contribute to the research continuity in this region by the younger generation.

The author of the project spoke about the Collected Works of N.N. Miklouho-Maclay in six volumes, the second edition, revised and supplemented, that was published by the Miklouho-Maclay Foundation with the support of the Russian Cultural Foundation and the participation of the staff of the Institute of Oriental Studies the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology named after N.N. Miklouho-Maclay (the Russian Academy of Sciences).

Online Museum N.N. Miklouho-Maclay is now available at the link: http://mikluho-maclay.online/

The project “Online Museum of N.N. Miklouho-Maclay" is being implemented by the Foundation for the Preservation of Ethnocultural Heritage named after Miklouho-Maclay with the support of the Presidential Grants Fund and expert support of the Study Center of the South Pacific Region of the Institute of Oriental Studies (the Russian Academy of Sciences) and the Researchers Association of the South Pacific Region.