SCIENCE MUSEUM


Our Mission:
The Science Museum is a national, official Venezuelan institution. Its mission is to spread science as well as to contribute to the increase of public knowledge and to the appreciation of the sciences as well as to inform on the scientific heritage of the country. It is also concerned with increasing scientific knowledge, researching, preserving and safekeeping the scientific and cultural heritage of the Museum.

How do we carry out this mission?
-By contributing to a multilevel interpretation of the different, top-priority realities necessary for an understanding of the country and its people.
-By promoting discussions on Venezuela.
-By contributing to a global way of thinking, encouraging the integration of all knowledge and the interdisciplinary work of specialists.
-By promoting creativity, a capacity for abstraction and innovation, specifically among the younger members of the population.

Our collections:
We serve as custodians for eleven collections with a total of almost 200,000 objects, pieces and zoological specimens.

Physical Anthropology, Archeology, Ethnography, Herpetology, Ichthyology, Invertebrates Mineralogy Ornithology, Paleontology, Teriology and the documentary collection.

These collections constitute the national heritage of the nation.

The main, historical building of the Museum was designed by the architect, Carlos Raul Villanueva and has since, been declared National Heritage.

Some History
In 1844, Juan Manuel Cajigal, Jacinto Rodriguez and José Rafael Revenga presented before Congress a project for the creation of a National Museum, oriented towards the natural sciences and history. The proposal was rejected.

Thirty years later a distinguished personality from the scientific circles in Venezuela, the German scientist Adolf Ernst (co-founder of the Society of Physical and Natural Sciences in 1867) revived the National Museum project and its headquarters (built by Luis Muñoz Tébar) was finally inaugurated on October 28, 1875, during the presidency of Antonio Guzmán Blanco.

Later on, during General Juan Vicente Gomez´s government, the National Museum was divided into three large museums: the Fine Arts Museum, the Bolivarian Museum and the Museum of Archeology and Natural History. It was not until 1935, however, that the construction of its different headquarters was undertaken.

The architect Carlos Raul Villanueva designed the building of the Natural Science Museum. It has a neoclassical influence and the sculptures were designed by Francisco Narváez. The Museum was inaugurated on July 24, 1940. In the following years the Museum was headed by the archeologists Walter Dupoy (1940-1948), J.M. Cruxent (1948-1962) and the herpetologist Addem Ramón Lancini (1962-1991), among others.

On December 20, 1990, the Government created the Science Museum Foundation and the writer Domingo Miliani, who began the renovation of the Museum, headed its first Board of Directors. Raul Nass followed him as President between 1993 and 1995, at which time began a serious process of modernization and universality of the institution.


A modern Museum for Venezuela.
By modernizing its language and methods in recent years, the Science Museum now compares favorably with the excellency of most of the important museums of the country; this directs it towards the use of state-of-the-art technology and museographic innovations.

The path to modernization has meant a change in the management model of the Museum, as well as in its staff, in order to make it a productive institution with up-to-date work tools that allow it to join without setbacks, the demands of the new millennium.

Today the Science Museum is the National Museum with the most visitors and users in the country- almost 900,000 persons benefit from our services. The Museum has decided to become a place for the confluence of the different scientific disciplines and the different sectors of the society which promote the expansion of knowledge and the democratization of science; it has become a more accessible place for the public and this functions as an effective tool for reflecting on the country; in the same manner, investigation, learning, the increase of global thought and education in science also help in the understanding of the country.

The Museum promotes science as a useful resource that contributes to the progress of the Venezuelan society in the twentieth century.

General Director (E) Luis Galindo

Principal Headquarters: Plaza de los Museos, Parque Los Caobos, Caracas, Venezuela. Phone number: (582) 577.50.94 - 577.57.86 - 577.51.03 - Fax. (582) 574.90.41 - 573.23.68 - 571.12.65 P.O.Box 5883, Caracas, Venezuela, 1010.

CONSCIENCE'S REVOLUTION