Art Museum

Without tour guides and searching beforehand or afterwards for additional information, you might be missing out a lot. The museum has an excellent collection of Romanian Impressionism (from Grigorescu and Andreescu to Tonitza, Pallady, etc.), but the Post-WWI art selection is limited to a great slice of Țuculescu and a few otherwise fine works by Baba, Bernea, Ciucurencu, Piliuță (no sign of Ion Nicodim, possibly the best artist who was born in Constanta) and other (rather minor) artists. However, you get instead an entire half-floor of Ion Alin Gheorghiu paintings (the Suspended Gardens cycle with their alien abstractionism), featuring even a reconstructed atelier corner with exhilarating details. My favorite is the hidden corridor (featuring Marcel Janco, Corneliu Michailescu, some excellent pieces by Catargi and Micaela Eleutheriade and a few other surprises) on the ground floor, next to the rooms which regularly host temporary exhibitions (temporary exhibitions may also be visited on the last floor). Make sure to visit in the summer for the best temporary exhibitions (might want to do that when the sun is not too bright on the front side of the building). When it is not a big-name artist, these exhibitions are usually dull and overly conservative/localist in style. Also, keep in mind that the only way not to miss events/exhibitions is checking the posters at the entrance regularly. The promotion and Internet presence of the museum is still lackluster and there should be many improvements, but the current administration is geared towards discretion and conservation, not innovation.