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Museum development

The Living Museum of the Damara was developed and built by Hansbernhard Naobes in cooperation with the Living Culture Foundation Namibia. Since Hansbernhard visited a traditional Mafwe Museum in the Caprivi in 2004 , his dream was to present the traditional Damara culture in a museum.

In contrast to the Mafwe, who still posses a great part of their cultural memory and who have kept many of their traditional skills alive over the past, the original Damara culture has been nearly completely forgotten. Hansbernhard and his team had the task to reconstruct their culture and have passed with flying colours. Help was offered especially from another project of the Living Culture Foundation Namibia, the Living Museum of the Ju/’Hoansi-San, which especially helped the Damara to relearn the traditional techniques and skills.

Hansbernhard NaobesHansbernhard Naobes

In February 2010 the Museum opened – a huge success for the Damara, but especially for their culture, which can now be maybe partially saved.

In the Museum the visitors will now get to know how the Damaras used to live  in Namibia before the time of colonisation. How they forged, how they made their traditional dress and jewellery and how they retrieved food and medicine from the bush. Great importance is attached to representing the ancient culture as authentically as possible.

 

Latest News

12 April 2023
The employees and patients of the dialysis clinics in Tangermünde and Genthin handed over a donation of €4,000 to Dr. Ralf Kühn, founding member and chairman of the board of the German-Namibian association Living Culture Namibia at his farewell party...
27 January 2023
Thanks to a very generous donation of €3,600 from Ms. Ute Schmidt-Rohr, we were able to successfully complete the first part of the water infrastructure project at the Mbunza Living Museum. A pump was installed at the Samsitu campsite very close to t...
18 November 2022
 This meeting was a "follow-up" to the previous meeting in March 2022 to assess the project progress in the development of a Herero Living Museum in Otjokavare. From our side, two things were essential. Firstly: Better communication structures m...
01 October 2022
In August 2022 we paid a visit to the Mafwe at the Living Museum in the northern part of Namibia to, among other things, install a new road sign. The erection of the sign had become necessary because the Mafwe had moved two years ago and some of the ...
19 September 2022
The first stage of the water infrastructure project for the Mbunza is, thanks to a very generous donation, in the starting blocks. The access to a supply of water is one of basic human needs. However, this need is not fulfilled in many parts of Namib...
03 September 2021
We have a new infrastructure project and ask for your support. This project is about supplying the Mbunza community with clean drinking water (step 1) and creating a sustainable source of income in the form of a small campsite for visitors to the Liv...