Odesa

Monument to Armand Emmanuel du Plessi, Duke de Rishelye, who was one of the most popular Odesa mayors.

The Duke de Rishelye, a Frenchman by birth, emigrated to Russia after the Great French Revolution of 1789. In 1790, he participated in the capture of Izmail, in 1803 he was appointed the city of Odesa, and then the governor-general of Novorossiya.

Richelieu began to be called Emmanuel Yosypovych. For him, Odesa received a temporary exemption from taxes and was actively built.

When the Bourbons returned to power in France in 1814, the duke left for his homeland, donating all his property to the Odesa Rishelye Lyceum.

After his death in 1822, fundraising began, and in 1828 a monument to Duke Rishelye was erected. Sculptor Ivan Martos created the duke dressed in a Roman toga with a scroll in his hand and three brass bas-reliefs symbolizing agriculture, trade and justice. Today it is the most famous symbol of Odesa.

Pranksters recommend looking at Duke from the water hatch to the left of the monument. From this angle, the scroll in Duke Rishelye's hand looks very ambiguous.

The Genocide Museum "Territory of Memory" in Odesa opened in 2024 by Odesa Holocaust Research Center. The institution is located in the place of the Central Post Office in the center of the city.

The exposition reveals the history of the appearance of the term genocide, the fate of its authorship by Raphael Lemkin, the essence of the concept of the crime of genocide in international law, the tragic pages of the Holocaust and the history of salvation, the themes of the Armenian and Roma genocide, the Holodomor in Ukraine, the deportation of the Crimean Tatars, the genocides of the 21st century. A separate location is dedicated to the Russian-Ukrainian war.

The miniatures represent the railway station from which the Tatars were deported, the powder warehouses where Odesa Jews were burned, the episode of mass shooting and torture in Buch, the destroyed drama theater in Mariupol, Zmeyiny Island and the destruction of the Moscow cruiser.

The modern interactive exhibition space makes extensive use of multimedia digital technologies. A special emotional atmosphere is created with the help of point lighting. The multifunctional museum space includes a library and a discussion platform.

The Museum "Secrets of Underground Odesa" tells about the famous Odesa catacombs, on which stands the whole city. Their total length is estimated at about 2.5 thousand kilometers.

Most of Odesa's catacombs are underground quarries, in which the building stone rakushnyak, which was used to build most of the city's buildings, was mined. The system of catacombs also includes cavities of natural origin - karst and dilatancy caves.

At various times, the catacombs served as transshipment bases for smugglers, "raspberries" for gangs, places to gather underground, shelters for guerrilla and sabotage units, bomb shelters.

The museum in the dungeons on Moldavanka was established in 2013 by the military-historical club "Military Valor". Entering the catacombs, visitors are immersed in the past of the city. Here you can see the anti-nuclear bunker, go through the flooded part, visit the wild catacombs, visit the guerrilla parking lot and bandit raspberries and more.

The building of the Odesa National Academic Theater of Opera and Ballet is considered one of the most beautiful in the world.

It was created by Viennese architects Hermann Helmer and Ferdynand Felner, who also built theaters in Vienna, Budapest, Dresden, and Zagreb. The building is richly decorated in the Renaissance style with Baroque elements. A sculpture of the art muse Melpomene rises above the facade.

The auditorium in the French "rococo" style is impressive. On the ceiling are four paintings by Lefleur with scenes from Shakespeare's works, a luxurious chandelier. Petro Chaykovskyi, Mykola Rymskyi-Korsakov, Serhiy Rakhmaninov performed their works here, Fedir Shalyapin and Solomiya Krushelnytska sang, and Anna Pavlova danced.

In the repertoire: "Giselle", "Sleeping Beauty", "The Nutcracker", "Don Quixote", "Carmen Suite" and others.

The museum of the Opera Theater is open, and tours are held.

The Odesa Film Studio Museum opened in Odesa in 2017. The museum is located in a real film pavilion built in the 1930s. This pavilion is the largest on the territory of the Odesa Film Studio.

The exhibition of the film museum is the richest collection of costumes, scenery, and props for famous films shot at the Odesa Film Studio and highlights the history of the development of cinema, tells about the role of Odesa in the formation of cinema, reveals the stories of the filming of favorite films and what remained behind the scenes.

Visitors to the film museum are presented with locations from the most famous films of the Odesa Film Studio, which have long become classics, as well as the expositions "Golden Film Fund" (1970-1980) and "Modern Cinema of the Odesa Film Studio".

During the tour, visitors have the opportunity to immerse themselves in augmented reality, which allows them to "revive" museum exhibits and see their use directly in the film.

The Museum of Cinema Technology is located under the legendary film pavilion No. 1, in the film and lighting equipment workshop. The museum of cinema technology presents: film and lighting equipment, auxiliary camera equipment, projection, sound recording and playback equipment, editing, make-up and photographic areas, game and special transport in models and mock-ups, an old 35 mm projector with an original positive film with fragments of films of the Odesa Film Studio of different years.