Museum of New
Zealand
The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa is
the national museum of this unique nation that is situated in
Wellington, and commonly known as the Te Papa and Our Place;
with the words Te Papa Tongarewa meaning that has been broadly
translated as "the place of treasures of this land". The first
museum would be called the Colonial Museum and founded in 1865,
constructed on Museum Street, but in the mid 1930s it would be
relocated to a new structure on Buckle Street, where the
National Art Gallery of the country had been located. Te Papa
was started in 1992, and its official opening was in 1998. It
welcomed over one million visitors in its first five months,
with more than a million people coming here each year since. In
2004, a long term exhibition would be opened called Toi Te Papa:
Art of the Nation, and dedicated to showcasing the exciting
artworks from the New Zealand collection. Today, the museum sits
on the waterfront in Wellington, with six stories of
exhibitions, gifts shops and cafes that are dedicated to the
country's environment and culture. It has uniquely incorporated
outdoor areas with wetlands, native bushes and artificial caves,
with a second building housing a research building and storage
area, but not open to the public. The structure contains more
than 360,000 square feet of space and has thousands of lights
controlled by computer. Its exhibits include; culture, history,
natural history, archives, library and exhibitions that include;
awesome forces, Toi Te Papa Art of the Nation, Mountains to the
Sea, passports, Bush City, Golden days, blood, earth, fire,
signs of a nation, Mana Whenua and the Marae and Tangata o le
Moana. The museum has been steeped in some very controversial
subjects that can be discovered at the museum.
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