Museums - Etnografisch Museum

The Musée Municipal d’Ethnographie d’Anvers has an interesting collection of old objects from Africa, Oceania, Asia, and the Americas.
Initially the museum held works only from the Americas and Asia, but it added its first African objects, from the Belgian Congo, in 1920, when the town of Antwerp purchased a group of 1,600 works from dealer Henri Pareyn, already well known for having supplied pieces to the Tervuren Museum. While Central Africa is particularly well represented in the museum’s holdings, it also has numerous pieces from West African areas, collected in the course of a scientific expedition in 1938–1939 to Côte d’Ivoire sponsored by the University of Ghent and led by renowned Africanist Frans Olbrechts. The museum’s Oceanic collection represents various island cultures and includes an ensemble of exceptionally old and well-known masks from New Ireland. The museum has traditional and archaeological pieces from the Americas, including ceramic and stone sculptures from Mexico, feather ornaments, and Central American masks.
The museum moved into the building it currently occupies in 1988. Since then, it has acquired an international reputation for the quality of its permanent collection and its frequent temporary exhibitions.