Irkutsk Regional Museum of Local Lore

The Irkutsk Regional Museum is the oldest museum of Siberia, founded on December 3, 1782, has priceless monuments of historical and cultural heritage. The uniqueness lies in the collection, the basis of which is the materials of expeditions of outstanding researchers of Asia and scientists - members of the East Siberian Department of the Russian Geographical Society (VSORGO). IOCM funds have about 250 thousand units of storage of the main fund and about 160 thousand units of storage of the auxiliary fund.

More than 50 exhibitions are held annually at the museum’s exhibition areas. The museum funds are presented with objects, documents, photographs characterizing the life, material and spiritual culture of the peoples of Siberia, the Far East, Kamchatka, Korea, China and Mongolia. Ethnographic collections of the museum on the peoples of the Central Asian continent have about 30 thousand items of storage. Unique collections of archaeological monuments, including jade products of the New Stone Age, are 100 thousand units of storage. The museum has a photo fund of 40 thousand units of storage. The IOCM funds store religious items on Buddhism and shamanism. Natural and historical collections characterize the nature of the Irkutsk region and number 10 thousand units. The museum has one of the largest historical libraries in which materials of expeditions and researches of VSORGO scientists are collected. The book collection includes 80,000 books, newspapers and magazines. Particularly valuable are the scrolls of the XVII century, the Cathedral Codes of Alexei Mikhailovich, textbooks and atlases of the era of Peter I, old printed editions of the XVIII century. The library contains a collection of Chinese books of the XVIII-XIX centuries, numbering 440 items of storage. The huge information potential of the museum annually allows to receive more than 200 thousand visitors.

Winner of the contest "Changing Museum in a Changing World"