Description of the attraction
The Moscow House of Photography, or the Multimedia Art Museum, is the first museum in Russia to specialize in photography. The museum was founded in 1996 by the director of the MDF - Olga Sviblova. The House of Photography was transformed into the Multimedia Art Museum in 2003.
The collection of the museum today numbers about 80 thousand original photographs and negatives. The collection covers the history of Russian photography since 1850. The museum funds contain photographs of famous Russian masters of photography: Ivan Shagin, Alexander Grinberg, Anatoly Egorov, Dmitry Baltermants, Max Penson and others. In the collection of the museum, you can see video installations and works made using the latest technologies.
In 2006, the Rodchenko Moscow School of Photography and Multimedia was opened at the museum. The school has become the second educational institution in Russia that trains and graduates contemporary artists.
In 2010, the reconstruction of the MDF building was completed. The total area of the building after reconstruction is approximately 9000 sq. M. The museum has a storage facility. It meets all modern standards of museum storage. The building houses restoration workshops, a library for contemporary art and photography, and a photographic laboratory. The MDF has a photo studio for teenagers. The exhibition complex has a conference room, and the exhibition space is approximately 2500 sq. m. The roof of the museum is also exploited, from which a beautiful view of Ostozhenka and the Conception Monastery opens up.
Exhibition activity of MDF is wide and varied. In recent years, about 1500 exhibitions have been organized. These are exhibitions of Russian and foreign photography, which took place in Moscow, different regions of Russia, in various foreign countries. The International Days of Photography in Moscow and the International Moscow Festival "Fashion and Style in Photography" have become regular.
The museum hosts an annual competition for the best photo report about Moscow - "Silver Camera", established by the Moscow Government and the Moscow Department of Culture.
