This exhibition does not only display objects—it brings people back into focus. Through authentic testimonies and carefully selected artifacts, visitors will have the opportunity to discover the world of those who created and used these objects as part of their everyday lives. With revitalized photographs enhanced by cutting-edge AI technology, alongside narratives from people who shaped, crafted, and used these objects, visitors will experience the past in a direct and emotional way.
“From the slow rhythm of traditional life to the second half of the 20th century, when a new society changed labor, values, family, and daily life, the exhibition traces the deep social transformations that shaped folk culture. Socialism, industrialization, and urbanization not only altered the way people earned a living, but also opened up space for contemporary ethnographic museum practice to understand and interpret folk culture in a new way,” emphasizes Marko Stojanović, museum advisor and author of the exhibition “The manual way, the educated way, and toiling away”.
Special emphasis is placed on the systems of values, knowledge, and experiences that shaped entire generations.
Particular attention is given to the youngest visitors, who will have the chance to engage with objects and professions from the past through interactive content and participate in an educational game that creatively demonstrates the activities and tools once used in various trades.
The exhibition brings together the old and the new. The plow, hoe, scythe, and sickle stand alongside tractors, motor-cultivators, and combines. Simply and clearly, the objects reveal the intersections and tensions between old and new, traditional and modern, rural and urban.
This is not just an exhibition about objects. It is a story about people. About a culture that lives through them.
We invite the media and the public to attend the opening and be part of an event that reminds us why it is important to understand our own heritage.
