The country's main art museum occupies three connected 19th-century buildings on Bucharest Street — including the original girls' high school. The collection of around 33,000 pieces is the largest in Moldova and ranges from Byzantine icons through 19th-century Romanian masters to Western European prints and a respectable Soviet-era holding.
The medieval icon rooms on the first floor are the highlight: woodcarvings and silver-mounted Mother-of-God panels from monasteries across Bessarabia, many of them rescued during the Soviet anti-religious campaigns. Temporary exhibitions in the side wing rotate. Closed Tuesdays; the entrance fee is one of the lowest of any national museum in Europe.