For its upcoming “Container Architecture” exhibition, the NRW-Forum Duesseldorf invited architects, designers and artists from all over the world to submit designs for container architecture. In response, the group submitted some 100 designs — many built, others conceptual — for consideration. The exhibition, which runs from June 8 through September...
We interrupt our regularly scheduled guest posts, so I can write a submission of my own for American Guide Week. One of the questions in the original 1935 manual for the American Guide series of books asks for interesting landmarks in your district. Considering I live in Chicagoland and this...
As someone fascinated with people who obsessively collect, the Belhaven Memorial Museum sounds like it’s right up my hoarder alley. Located in a historic town hall, this giant antique store…ahem, I mean museum…displays over 40,000 objects that once belonged to one woman, Miss Eva Blount Way. (what a pleasant-looking lady,...
The John Michael Kohler Arts Center in Sheboygan, Wisconsin (my favorite town name EVER!) is featuring 51 photos collected through the popular website awkwardfamilyphotos.com. It’s the first time any of these pictures will be shown to the public in a museum setting. A particular stand-out, “Stacked Dominoes”, shows a family...
The 1963 Campaign led by civil rights activists in Birmingham, Alabama (which at the time was one of the most racially divided cities in the U.S.) culminated in a number of widely publicized confrontations between young black students and white civic authorities, mostly through water hoses and police dogs, that...
Here’s a random Saturday post for y'all with King Ludwig’s Gallery of Beauties (or Schönheitengalerie for those from Deutschland). In the south pavilion of Nymphenburg Palace is a collection of 36 portraits of the most beautiful women from the nobility and middle classes of Munich painted between 1827 and 1850....
Although I’ve been to Cumbria, England several times, I never got to visit the Laurel and Hardy Museum in Ulverston. In 1976, the mayor, Bill Cubin, found evidence that proved Stan Laurel (born Arthur Jefferson) was not born in North Shields as previously believed but in his grandparents’ house on...
This post is dedicated to my 500th follower artexpo. Let’s travel to another unexplored country with a visit to the Lofoten Torrfiskmuseum (Stockfish Museum) in Norway. What’s stockfish, you ask? Unsalted fish like cod, whitefish, pollock, haddock, long and tusk have been dried on wooden racks or in special drying...
Happy Pulaski Day! The Pulaski Museum in “downtown” Pulaski, Wisconsin is located at 129 West Pulaski Street. So totally go there if you want to learn about the town of Pulaski. I am sure there’s at least one reference to Casimir Pulaski. Okay, too many Pulaskis for you? Well, here’s...
I kind of hate postmodern art. My mom attempted to be an artist when I was growing up so I always felt part of that world. But the shit I see nowadays just annoys the fuck out of me. I know this girl who lives in Ukrainian Village here in...
Forget about San Francisco or Woodstock or wherever it is hippies live nowadays. Arcola is the home of Moomaw America’s One and Only Hippie Memorial. Although I live in the state of Illinois, going south of Chicago is too far south for me so I don’t think I’ll ever get...
Late last year I mentioned how much I wanted to go to the Busy Beaver Button Company here in Chicago. Well, last month during Obscura Day, a celebration of hidden wonders and unusual places in one’s hometown, I am happy to say I finally paid visit. Founded in 1995, the...
