Croatia’s Museums of Illusions to Turn into Museums of Reality

On the occasion of the 70th Anniversary of UNICEF, on 12 December the Museum of Illusions in Zagreb will again turn into the Museum of Reality, making the disturbing reality in which many of the world’s children live come alive.

This interesting story, which began in 2015, is successfully expanding, and this year, the Museum of Reality will open in two more cities apart from Zagreb – in Zadar and Ljubljana.

Virtual reality, optical illusions, installations and holograms are some of the “exhibits” that will be used to present the reality of most vulnerable children and create a realistic interactive experience which offers new perspectives of today’s world, where due to poverty, natural disasters and conflict, millions of people, including 500 million children, live in extremely difficult circumstances.

This year’s exhibition includes new interactive exhibits providing an insight into everyday life entirely different from the world of illusions, focusing on highly relevant issues.

Stepping into the Museum of Reality will enable the visitors to enter UNICEF’s time machine and learn about the achievements that had been made to benefit children over the past 70 years, visit a village in Kenya with Ewan McGregor, step into a goldmine where miners are children, play a computer game for the blind, or leaf through a photo album with wedding photos of child brides.

In addition, they will be able to open the door of the hunger room, see what a school looks like after a hurricane, try to find a way out of the media labyrinth, and hear “endless testimonies” about traumas which are hard to heal.

Visitors to the Museum will also be able to find out what UNICEF, with citizens’ support, is doing for the most disadvantaged children, and actively engage in the Guardians of Childhood (Čuvari djetinjstva) programme to support the creation of a better, safer and fairer world for children.

The Museum of Reality will be open in Zagreb from 12 to 18 December from 9 AM to 10 PM, and in Zadar from 14 to 18 December from 10 AM to 8 PM. Admission will be free for all visitors. Recommended age: 12+