Historical Ethnographic Museum of Lower Valsesia (MEV)

The experience

The MEV, a museum in Romagnano to collect testimonies of peasant civilization: objects and things, tools and instruments, of a life of work that have a soul and still speak to us of work, sweat and sacrifices; people who with a glass of wine have renewed the cult of friendship and solidarity; simple people but of great dignity and wisdom.” (Fernanda Renolfi, 1990).

To grasp something that was escaping”, to save a world, to preserve the memory, the life, the wisdom of a territory.

It is the early seventies and the teacher Fernanda Renolfi has very clear ideas. She is not alone: next to her is Adriana Prolo, her trusted friend, companion of many walks.

For “his” Museum, that of Cinema in Turin, he fought tooth and nail. Adriana is like that: she doesn’t dream, she plans… and projects soon become actions.

So the two women begin to collect the objects of that peasant world still so alive in their minds, to save their memory. But not only that, every aspect of daily life between the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries interests the two women.

Adriana collects toys and gives the Museum the dolls with which she and her sisters played in the now distant days of childhood. To support them, Carlo Dionisotti, “the Professor” esteemed by all, who returned from London to his Romagnano.

But where to place all those objects? Where to set up a museum? Giuseppe Tinelli provides a building of his own, an old peasant house, a stone’s throw from Piazza Libertà in Romagnano. It’s perfect. There is no shortage of friends, collaborators: those who help to tidy up the spaces, those who bring objects, those who tell and describe traditions, those who welcome and assist the public.

In 1975 the Museum was opened to the public and it was a great celebration. An adventure made up of memory, research, collaboration, passion begins.

To animate, support and nourish the group, Carlo Brugo, with his commitment to historical research, his tenacity and his love for the Museum.

In 2006 the Museum found a new location: Villa Caccia.

The charming Villa Antonelliana, owned by the Municipality, proves to be the ideal place for the start of a new phase. The East wing was chosen, which was originally home to agricultural activities and this place allowed not only museum activity, but also to open the Museum to other institutions and associations, inaugurate an educational offer for schools, organize events.

Since then, the Museum has been at the center of many activities, which make it not only a place where the ethnographic heritage is preserved and enhanced, but in which an entire territory is told.