Guida pratica

After having been closed to the public in 2000, the Museo delle Culture Estraeuropee "Dinz Rialto" in Rimini has reopened in its new address "Villa Alvardo" on Covgnano’s hill. This is one of the main Italian museums entirely dedicated to ethnologic and archaeological aspects about different cultures from Africa, Oceania, pre-Columbian America and in a small part from Asian culture.
After the inauguration on 17th December 2005,  the museum has assumed the new denomination "Museo degli Sguardi. Rimini's Ethnographic Collections" according to the project by the anthropologist Marc Augé, director of the "École des Hautes Éstudes de Paris" and by the "Comitato Ordinatore".

The museum is located in an ancient and valuable villa built in 1721 by Giovani Antonio Alvarado, who was Emperor Carlo VI of Spain’s secretary in Italy. The villa has been restored by Rimini’s City Council and now is ready to house an important part of the 7.000 works that belong to the museum’s patrimony. As a matter of fact, the Museum analyses the occidental look towards "the cultures of the others" throughout the centuries.
The villa, which had already been the centre of the Museum "Delle Grazie" in the Fransiscan cloister since 1928, houses some objects that were collected by the Friars themselves during their missions. Nowadays, some of these objects become part of the Museum’s immense collection which boasts valuable archaeological and ethnographic works from Africa, Oceania and Asia and among them, it can be distinguished the prestigious pre-Columbian Archaeological Collection belonging to Ugo Canepa from Biella. This collection includes several materials produced from different cultures and civilisations once scattered in the American continent before the Spanish Conquerors’ arrival during the XVI century.
Lately the Museum has become rich also thanks to a limited but meaningful Amazonian collection donated by Mr. Bruno Fusconi from Cesena.