#Exhibit of the Month

The main parts of the camera include the body, bellows, lens, and viewfinder system. The body consists of two lacquered walnut wood frames, joined by a folding black textile bellows that allows the necessary extension for focusing. On the front panel is the Agfa anastigmat lens, mounted in a Compur-type shutter produced by F. Deckel in Munich. It features a foldable "brilliant" viewfinder for both portrait and landscape orientation. It uses glass photographic plates coated with a photographic emulsion, mounted in walnut wood holders, with a frame size of 9x12 cm.
The walnut wood model, considered the flagship "Agfa Isolar Luxus," was designed by the A.H. Rietzschel factory in Munich, acquired by AGFA in 1925, which continued producing this type of camera under its own name until the late 1920s.
The piece was restored by Mihail Culașco, Restoration Department of NMHM.
Brief History of the Camera
The history of the camera spans 200 years, evolving from the camera obscura to today's digital devices. Key milestones include: the first permanent photograph in 1826 by French physicist Joseph Nicéphore Niépce, using a wooden box and a plate coated with bitumen of Judea; the invention of the first photographic process - daguerreotype - in 1839 by Frenchman Louis Daguerre, marking the official birth of photography; the invention of calotype, based on the negative/positive principle, by British physicist and chemist Fox Talbot; the invention of wet collodion plates by Englishman Frederick Scott Archer and dry glass plates by Richard Leach Maddox and John Huds Bennet; the introduction of flexible roll film and the launch of the first Kodak camera by American inventor George Eastman; the release of the first 35 mm film camera by German company "Leica"; the launch of the first instant camera "Polaroid," invented by American Edwin Land. Finally, starting in 1975, this path led to the digital photography revolution. Each successive step made cameras smaller and faster, significantly improving image quality.
The first photographic studio in Chișinău was opened in 1854 by Eduard Glewski, and before World War I, there were already about 100 photography studios in Bessarabia.
The collection of the National Museum of History of Moldova includes over 30 cameras, made in Austria, Germany, France, USSR, Japan, and China, dating from the late 19th century to the 2000s. Among them are folding bellows cameras, BOX-type cameras, single-lens reflex (SLR) and twin-lens reflex (TLR) cameras, as well as digital (DSLR) cameras.

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Archaeological research at the Mazarache church from Chisinau

July – October, 2010

During July – October, 2010 the archaeological expedition of the National Museum of Archaeology and History of Moldova carried out investigations near the Mazarache Church from Chisinau and in the cemetery adjacent to the site. In about 40 investigated graves together with other material able to shed light on the time periods when the cemetery was used (pottery, buttons, earrings, rings, etc.) there were found many coins attributed to the medieval and pre-modern times. At the same time, there were discovered a defensive ditch of the Early Iron Age, a cellar of the 17th – 18th centuries, and remnants of an aqueduct of the 19th century.

Being founded, apparently, in 1742, the Mazarache Church from Chisinau which is dedicated to the Intercession of the Virgin is considered to be the oldest church in the city and is built in the Moldavian style.

It should be mentioned that the archaeological investigations by the Mazarache Church have confirmed the information from written sources on the location of Chisinau (the Gospodar’s charter of July 17, 1436, which refers to Chesenaul of Acbas, and one of 1466 about the settlement of Chisinau near the Albisoara Fountain), and local tradition about the place of the old heart of the town that had been located in the immediate vicinity of the promontory, on which, perhaps, the oldest local church was built.