Dimitar Bogov: Promoting Macedonia's cultural and historical values
Opening speech by Mr Dimitar Bogov, Governor of the National Bank of the Republic of
Macedonia, at the opening of the exhibition titled "Wall Paintings from the Episcopal Basilica
in Stobi" on the occasion of the International Museum Day, Skopje, 18 May 2012.
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Honorable Minister Kancheska-Milevska,
Your Excellency, Ambassador Wohlers,
Distinguished guests,
This year we celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the monetary independence of the
Republic of Macedonia, recalling with respect the period of creation of the Macedonian
Denar and the processes that led to the proclamation of the monetary sovereignty of our
country on April 26, 1992. Undoubtedly, this is an opportunity when it is necessary to say that
in the past twenty years, the main carrier of these processes - the National Bank of the
Republic of Macedonia, with all its capacity has adequately served the new democratic
society, as an institution that is responsible for maintaining the stability of the Macedonian
national currency and its monetary and financial system.
Besides its primary activity, in the past 10 years, our institution has sought to continuously
and systematically contribute to the preservation, care and promotion of cultural and
historical values of Macedonia. As it is actually typical for most central banks in the world,
through the work of its museum, the National Bank has gradually established itself as an
important cultural treasury of the numismatic cultural legacy of civilizations that existed in this
region, thus giving its contribution to the enrichment of the Macedonian society with
permanent and irreplaceable values; those without which common knowledge is doomed to
poverty, without which we would not be able to recognize and understand the universal
values of civilization that have been mounting for centuries in the long civilization pace of
human existence.
The National Bank of the Republic of Macedonia, together with the National Institution Stobi,
have decided to approach the Macedonian public exactly on May 18th - the International
Museum Day, jointly organizing this important exhibition, where for the first time an extremely
valuable cultural heritage is presented to the public. It includes 19 unique fresco-fragments
from the inner walls of the Old Episcopal basilica in Stobi, dating from the 4th century BC,
which the history of art considers an exclusivity of paramount importance, given that this kind
of artistic creation is not present in the wider range of the European mainland. Within the
exhibition, the curators from the National Institution Stobi enabled us to closely look at the
details of the mosaic floors that decorated this building. In addition, part of the exhibition are
also the unique fresco-details that adorned the baptistery, which is located next to the
Basilica. The exclusively crafted marble container also belongs to the baptistery, as part of its
internal decoration, which, on its part, includes the famous mosaics with depictions of
peacocks. Those were the peacocks that the artist Biljana Unkovska used when designing
the layout of the modern Macedonian banknotes of ten Denars.
Speaking of the ancient town of Stobi, besides the fact that it is really a constant inspiration
for artistic creation, in the past it was a center with emphasized monetary production that
took place more than 18 centuries ago.
This exhibition is even more significant because of the generous support of the US Embassy
in the Republic of Macedonia, which throughout the past years has enabled professional
protection of these invaluable paintings, thanks to which they can now be publicly exhibited.
The National Bank is honored by the given trust to host this exhibition, which I hope that over
the next month will be an intriguing cultural event for the general public. I also hope that with
the support of the Ministry of Culture and of the other institutions of culture in Macedonia,
also in the future we will have an opportunity to enrich the public life and the creative social
pulse of the country's cultural life.
Expressing my sincere gratitude to the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Macedonia, the
National Institution Stobi and the Embassy of the United States in the Republic of
Macedonia, I invite His Excellency, the Ambassador of the United States, Paul Wohlers and
the Minister of Culture of the Republic of Macedonia, Elizabeta Kancheska-Milevska to take
the floor.