NONAM (North America Native Museum) Zurich

"We really enjoyed the tour— had to kindly ask for one as everything is in German
The museum now collects contemporary indigenous art which is essential to counterbalance their collection. We saw the exhibition “honoring our graduates” which is insightful and beautiful!"

Kostis Kalamas

"Great design museum with a lot of useful information. You should spend 1-2 hours here to discover the culture of Nord America with exihibitions and artifacts are rebuilt. You can touch them and take photos easily and comfortable. Interesting to visit here."

Trang Nguyen

"It is rare to find a museum dedicated to North American indigenous cultures in Europe, even when one includes those scarce ethnographic museums that have some Native American material on display. Yet, though small, this brightly lit, warmly coloured and modern-looking museum presents an excellent overview of the material cultures of North America. Taking the traditional division of North America into cultural zones - such as the Woodlands, Great Plains and Northwest Coast - as a point of departure, the museum presents the artistic achievements of the people indigenous to these regions.

The exhibit includes objects and attire ranging from ancient to modern, and from small to large, accompanied by short texts on informational signs. A film continuously shown in a walk-in theatre room provides some additional background to the cultural zones that underlie the exhibition's design. Unfortunately, though, this is where information provision ends, and the objects on display seem to have been primarily presented as "objets d'art". That is, their cultural context, their significance to the people who made them, remains largely undiscussed, let alone visualized. Though a common issue with many smaller and privately held museums, this greatly reduces the educational value such a collection is able to provide. What's more, current topics on Native American culture - such as the cultural genocide and persecution of Native Americans at the hands of European settlers in the Americas, the struggle for survival and recognition, NAGPRA, and cultural revival - are completely absent from the exhibition, which has the result of freezing Native American culture in time. To me, restructuring the exhibition to (include) discuss(ion) on these topics would be a great way to improve on an otherwise excellent museum collection.

One of the museum's two floors, however, is reserved for changing exhibitions (one on Edward S. Curtis when we were there). This not only provides visitors with a reason to keep coming back, but also allows the museum to tackle exactly those topics as aren't broached by the permanent exhibit - even if the strong division between temporary and permanent exhibit makes it difficult to connect the two, and each temporary exhibit only provides part of the missing picture.

All the same, this is a very beautiful museum with an excellent collection from a region of the world not often seen in Europe, and, as such, certainly worth a visit!"

Alexander Melchers