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New Zealand: Auckland – Guerrilla Girls Collection at Auckland Art Gallery Toi oTamaki

In 1984 an exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in NYC was an International Survey of Recent Painting and Sculpture. Of the 165 important paintings and sculptures mentioned, only 15 were created by women. The furor of this inequity started the Guerilla Girls movement to end gender and racial discrimination in museums everywhere . They created defiant and humorous pamphlets, videos, books and posters shown around the world. This call to action was to erase the double standard.

New Zealand: Auckland Domain – Auckland War Museum

In the stately columned Auckland War Museum, you can discover the world’s largest collection of Maori and Polynesian artifacts. Sitting impressively in the center is a large ornately carved Hotunui meetinghouse from 1878 and a Waka (war canoe), Te Toki-a-Tapiri from 1836. They’re heart and soul of the museum, yet there’s lots more.

US: Seattle, WA – Architecture of Seattle’s Museum of Pop Culture

The fantastical sheet metal walls of MoPop were designed by Frank Gehry. It is often quoted as looking like a smashed electric guitar. Gehry himself had made the comparison, “We started collecting pictures of Stratocasters, bringing in guitar bodies, drawing on those shapes in developing our ideas.”

Despite some critical reviews of the structure, the building has been called “a fitting backdrop for the world’s largest collection of Jimi Hendrix memorabilia.” The outside of the building which features a fusion of textures and colors, including gold, silver, deep red, blue and a “shimmering purple haze,” has been declared “an apt representation of the American rock experience.

 

US: Seattle, WA – Cartoon Illustration by Hendrix

On the back of Jimi Hendrix’s “Love or Confusion” lyrics, this drawing from early 1967 is believed to be by Hendrix and his girlfriend Kathy Etchingham. It depicts his Dylan-esque hair, military jacket, Iron Cross necklace, heeled boots and towering Marshall amplifier stack. It also references his manager, band members, and other groups like the Who and the Beatles.

US: Seattle, WA – Jimi Hendrix’s Outfit and Guitar

Jimi Hendrix paraphernalia has a big part to play in the MoPop museum collection in Seattle, WA .

Austria, Innsbruck: Musical Dancing Water under Crystal Clouds

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Leave time for outdoor wows at Swarovski Crystal World, Austria. The Mirror Pool surrounded by Crystal Clouds was gorgeous in itself – and then the music started…..

Austria, Innsbruck: Cinderella Swarovski Crystal Worlds

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Aha, so that’s where the prince had Cinderella’s glass slipper made! (at Swarovksi)

Austria, Innsbruck: Star Crooner’s Crown Swarovski Crystal Worlds

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Elton John’s crown made by Swarovski crystal.

Austria, Innsbruck: Crystal Skull Swarovski Crystal Worlds

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Death becomes her when she’s made out of crystal.

France, Paris: The Unnerving Raft of the Medusa at the Louvre

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If you think life is tough, think of all the sailors that went out into the unknown seas. The shipwrecked Madusa, was left with 115 out of the original 400 sailors on board. There was very little food and water but lots of wine which led to heavy drinking, murder, mutiny and cannibalism. When rescued, only 15 were left alive. This work by Theodore Gericault’s was a seismic shift in art from the stiff neo-classicism of the past to the dramatic and emotional Romanticism in art. It is more of the most macabre painting in the Louvre.