Maritime Museum, Sjöhistoriska museet, Stockholm, Sweden Maritime history, and the way that people have used the sea for exploration and trade, is fascinating. I never really got it until I visited the oh-so wonderful Maritime Museum in Amsterdam. Since then, if there is a museum on the subject, I’m there. Unfortunately none of the ones I’ve visited since have really…
Ethnographic Museum, Etnografiska Museet, Stockholm, Sweden What is interesting about going to Ethnographic Museums in different countries is that they all have a slightly different emphasis: some, like the Museum of Culture in Basel, have a lot of objects from Papua New Guinea; the Ethnographic Museum in Zurich has an extraordinary Chinese collection. Each reflects the interests of the people…
Confluence Museum, Musée des Confluences, Lyon, France When planning a trip to Lyon, you will be struck by the hype for the Museum of the Confluence. It’s a striking new glass building, opened in 2014, perched on an island on the Rhone, and it has a glossy modernity that promises an attractive museum-going experience. In France, where so many museums…
What’s New at the Palace? Exhibition, Narbonne, France With the opening of a new museum on Roman Narbonne, NarboVia, in 2020, the Palace Museums complex decided to show off some of its collections that have been languishing away from the public gaze. Since the Roman objects will be leaving the Palace, their place will be taken by others plucked from…
Mirabilis Exhibition at the Popes’ Palace, Avignon Staged in a grand hall in the Popes’ Palace in 2018 was an exhibition which highlighted the treasures found across Avignon’s five main museums and galleries: the Petit Palais, Calvet, Requien, Roure and Lapidaire. What made it rather special was the fact that it was curated by Christian Lacroix. Despite the fact that…
Chinese Opera, A Ópera Chinesa, Museum of the Orient, Lisbon, Portugal I am fortunate enough to have visited a number of wonderful exhibitions in my time, but only a few of them have had a profound effect on my life. This one on Chinese Opera at the Museum of the Orient is in my top five most influential exhibitions. On the…
Museum of the Orient, Museu do Oriente, Lisbon, Portugal When creating a list of museums to visit in Lisbon, I wasn’t that bothered about getting to the Museum of the Orient. There were other priorities. On our last day in the city, I decided to go here first, spend a few hours, and hop on to another place nearby. We stayed…
Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, Museu Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon, Portugal While America is littered with museums built around the varied collections of their millionaire founders, this sort of thing is much rarer in Europe. The Armenian Calouste Gulbenkian, who made his fortune from oil, put his money to good use and amassed an amazing little collection of objects from across the ages which…
St Mungo Museum of Religious Life and Art, Glasgow, Scotland Mankind has created some of its finest art for religion, so the idea of having a museum dedicated to Religious Art was very appealing. The museum, right next to Glasgow Cathedral, opened in 1993, and exhibits objects relating to the world’s major religions. It aims to “explore the importance of…