Odesa Museum of Fine Arts damaged by Russian missile strike on 124th anniversary
On the eve of its 124th anniversary, the Odesa National Fine Arts Museum was struck by a Russian missile drone. On November 5th, the Unesco-listed port city on Ukraine‘s Black Sea coast was shelled by a widespread attack from the invading Russian forces.
Shortly after the incident, the museum announced it would be forced to cancel its plans for the anniversary celebrations while “consequences of the damage” were assessed. Although the building remains structurally sound, the museum listed seven exhibitions that “due to damage to the museum, we can no longer exhibit.”
The Odesa National Fine Arts Museum shared photographs depicting the extent of the damage. Broken windows, cracked plaster and displaced ornaments tell of a violent shock wave. The museum itself is a cherished artefact located in the 19th-century Potocki Palace.
The museum’s deputy director for development, Oleksandra Kovalchuk, posted on her personal Facebook page: “I think that there will be many posts about our museum. Please do not forget to wish it a Happy Birthday.”
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s Ministry of Culture noted that the building is in “Unesco’s protection zone” and that at least ten other nearby buildings sustained damage during the raid.
On Telgram, Oleh Kiper, the Ukrainian military governor for Odesa, added that “the Russians’ congratulated’ our architectural monument with a rocket that hit nearby”.
Kiper also reassured Ukrainians that most of the museum’s collection was safe. “The Odesa regional state administration, together with the museum and the Museum for Change NGO, evacuated most of the collection in advance,” he wrote.
The museum’s catchment was only added to Unesco’s list of endangered world heritage sites in January 2023. This resulted from a plea from the country’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky. On Monday, Unesco’s Kyiv-based liaison office wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that it “strongly condemns the attack.”
