You may not get that great museum smell, and you won’t see Madrid out the windows, but you can now see hi res images of 14 of the artworks at the Prado Museum (Museo Nacional del Prado) on Google Earth. You can even see brushstrokes.
Click here to try it. The video above shows you how they did it and how it all works.
Kudos to the Prado for making their art so available. Even if you bought a big coffee table book of these works, you wouldn’t see detail this fine. This is an all-new idea.
Reclusive, crazy and not as prolific as most other artists, Francis Bacon produced only around 1,000 paintings before his death. Around the world, his pieces appear one or two at a time, but few have the resources or reason to assemble a large retrospective. This year, that changes.
One hundred years ago, Francis Bacon was born. For his centennial, exhibitions are rumored to be planned at London’s Tate and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. But, I was surprised to see a large sign as I walked along the Paseo del Prado last week: Francis Bacon. Until April 19, 2009, you’ll be able to witness the progression of this genius’s work over four decades, with a collection of unusual breadth and depth (take a closer look here).
This is an interesting time for Francis Bacon. Last year, his work was among the hottest in the world, with Russian energy figure Roman Abramovich dropping $86.3 million on a triptych painted in 1976. Not even a full year later, the art market is in turmoil, and the auction houses are unable to move Bacon’s work, it seems, at any price. It feels like a sad undercurrent to what should be a year of celebration, but New York artist Nelson Diaz disagrees. Diaz appears to be downright prophetic, having protested the art market’s ascent with a political statement via eBay last summer. At the time, he explained that Bacon would have been disgusted with the high prices that his work fetched. Nelson’s protest is over, but it does make rich background for what should be a year of Francis Bacon retrospectives around the world.
In the video below, Nelson explains last summer’s project and its connection to Francis Bacon. If you’re looking to the future, his latest project is “The Isolated Christ.”
Whether you stop by the Tate, Met or Museo del Prado to enjoy the Francis Bacon centennial, keep this back-story in mind. It changes everything you’ll see.
Among collected artifacts are about 340 pieces from the SI and 20 other archaeological organizations around the world, including original lead coffins, facial reconstructions, life size models and other eerie windows into the past.
Insiders bill the exhibition as the Smithsonian’s version of CSI, where scientists have examined the remains of these colonists, reconstructed their lives and retold their stories around their past. It should be a pretty interesting story.
The exhibition will be on display for the next two years, so if you can’t make it down to DC anytime soon, you’ve got a little bit of time to build an itinerary. And don’t forget, access the spectrum of Smithsonian Museums is free, so this could be the budget destination that you’ve been looking for.
During China’s Cultural Revolution, one of Mao’s bright ideas, people burned, broke, buried and threw out loads of items connected to the arts and intellectual pursuits. Lately, due to economic development, the treasures found in Beijing’s old neighborhoods are being removed in the name of development. Old houses along alleyways that date back to the imperial city are being torn down and modern buildings thrown up at a dizzying rate. Eighty-eight percent of the original, ancient neighborhoods are gone, according to this New York Times article.
The article is mostly about one man who has taken up the cause to save the buildings’ architectural treasures like ornate doorways, screens and statues. Li Sontang has been collecting these items for years by going to sites where buildings are torn down. He’s able to get the goods for nothing and has paid workers to take away the heavy stuff. With the bounty Sontang has gathered, he started a museum.
The Songtangzhai Museum is housed in a two-story building from the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) . With its $4.50 admission fee, the museum offers people a glimpse into what Beijing looked like before Mao and bulldozers showed up. I’m hoping that Beijing officials get a clue that they have a tourist hot spot if they stop tearing down what is left. Restore it to its earlier beauty and entice people to head there by the opening of interesting shops and eateries. All they need to do is turn to Singapore’s Boat Quay to see what can occur.
There was a neighborhood I visited in the mid-1990s that that was in back of Mao’s tomb. Of all we did in Beijing, wandering down the alleys was the highlight of our trip. One family who didn’t know English invited us into their humble house for tea. In one shop, I bought two carved wooden panels that were probably off of someone’s door. One panel is of children doing a dragon dance. The other shows another ceremony. I’m wondering if the neighborhood is still there anymore. I doubt it. How terrific it is that there are people like Li Sontang who recognize treasures and save them.
NASA has three space shuttles scheduled for retirement in the next two years, and for the first time ever, museums will have to shell out big bucks if they want to display the crafts.
NASA estimates that it will cost $42 million to get each shuttle ready for display — including $6 million to transport it — and they are asking the museums to foot the bill. NASA has never charged institutions like the Smithsonian in the past, but with the Ares I rocket and Orion capsule believed to be well over budget, NASA insiders say the program needs to pinch pennies wherever possible.
$42 million seems steep, but NASA isn’t trying to squeeze a profit out of these charges. This is simply their estimated cost for safing, display preparation, and transportation of a shuttle. “Safing” means decontamination of the fuel systems and removal of other safety and environmental hazards.
No museums have commented yet as to whether or not they would be willing to pay NASA’s asking price, which, by the way, is “subject to change.”
Click the images to learn about the most unusual museums in the world — from funeral customs, to penises, to velvet paintings, to stripping.