Moldavian Art Museum

(Art Museum of the Moldavian SSR), a museum founded in 1940. Its original collection was lost during the fascist occupation of Kishinev from 1941 to 1944. The museum was reopened in 1944. Major contributions from the Central Museum Fund of the USSR in the second half of the 1940’s enabled the museum to create sections of Soviet, Russian, and Western European art. Through carefully planned acquisitions, the museum was able to open a section devoted to Moldavian art from the Middle Ages to the Soviet period, including works by V. F. Okushko, I. T. Bogdesko, M. G. Greku, L. P. Grigorashenko, L. I. Dubinovskii, K. S. Kobizeva, and S. S. Chokolov. In 1973 the museum contained more than 8,000 works.