The Musée National de la République Démocratique du Congo (MNDRC) is home to thousands of artefacts, artworks, and records relating to the many cultures and communities of this complex central African country.

The museum is a beautiful landmark in Kinshasa, the Congo’s sprawling and congested capital. The museum’s architecture blends traditional design with visionary engineering – it is an uplifting testament to what is possible with collaboration, peace, investment, and hope.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo RC is a vast and fragmented country. Spread over a dense green swathe of central Africa, travel within DRC can be daunting and dangerous. Infrastructure is developing, and the nation is still healing after centuries of violence and exploitation. DRC can sometimes feel like not one country but many, bound uneasily by the past.

The DRC is, nevertheless, astonishingly rich. By some estimates, it is home to more precious resources than anywhere else. It is the wealthiest country in theory, but one of the poorest in practice. On a social level, DRC is home to countless tribes, ethnic groups and communities. These overlap across the country, from Lake Kivu in the east to the Atlantic Ocean in the west, tracing the currents of the mighty Congo River and forming a fertile patchwork of languages, belief systems, and political traditions.

In the cool cloisters and galleries of the MNRDC in Kinshasa, Congo’s many cultures align brilliantly into a single, clear focus. The sunlight sloping through its high windows illuminates millennia of history. The expressive artistic imagination of the Congolese people jumps and crackles in every room, like an electric charge.

The DRC pavilion presents the MNRDC in vivid virtual reality. Connecting physical and digital dimensions, the pavilion plunges visitors into a pageant of African culture and brings the powerful Congo spirit to life.