The Exploratorium in San Francisco provides a fertile platform for curious minds. It opens the door to varied frontiers of knowledge for both children and adults. It encourages everyone to wonder – What? How? Why? Abstract concepts of science are displayed in an easy-to-understand format and are highly interactive. No wonder, the Exploratorium is one of the top attractions in San Francisco. The strict barriers between art and science blur in the different exhibits and present a creative space to think further, increase our ability to understand the world around us, and inspire us to strive for the unknown. Here, the journey to every exhibit starts with wonder and ends with wonder. While exploring the Exploratorium in San Francisco, I felt that despite our limitations and fallibilities, we humans are capable of greatness because we seek. If you are in San Francisco then keep aside a day to explore Exploratorium – a destination that reveals our world to us through science, art, and human perception.
Category: Museums Page 1 of 4
The word museum has its origins in the Ancient Greek word of Mouseion, which denotes a place or temple dedicated to the Muses (the patron divinities in Greek mythology of the arts). The meaning of “museums” has changed considerably over time since they started becoming popular in Europe. Formerly a means to display exotic things collected by wealthy men to their fellow wealthy friends, museums are now open to all people; they are for the enjoyment and enlightenment of all.
The role of museums in society has also evolved a great deal. With the advent of the internet, it is no longer a significant source of historical or factual information presented in a chronological fashion. Rather, the best museums now try to provoke a response in the mind of the audience. How did people live with vastly different means and technologies so far back in time? Were they less happier then? How did people suffer during a war? Do modern wars lead to less pain? How did a technological leap change society? Has it benefitted everybody? The visitor can be forced, even for a few moments, to confront her existence juxtaposed with these conundrums.
While standing inside the National Lynching Memorial or the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, in Montgomery, Alabama, I read these death notices.
- After an overcoat went missing from a hotel in Tifton, Georgia, in 1900, two black men were lynched, whipped to death while being “interrogated” in the woods.
- Mary Turner was lynched, with her unborn child, at Folsom Bridge at the Brooks-Lowndes County line in Georgia in 1918 for complaining about the recent lynching of her husband, Hayes Turner.
- William Donegan was lynched in Springfield, illinois, in 1908 for having a white wife.
- Ernest Green and Charlie Lang, both 14, were lynched in Shubuta, Mississippi, in 1942 after a white girl said they were threatening.
and the list goes on ……
The Amsterdam Diamond Museum has a travel story to tell. About a journey which began three billion years ago, 200 km under the surface of the earth, and which ends in the ring on your finger or in the pendant on your necklace. The hero of this story is the diamond, the hardest material in the world, loveliest of all gemstones. Bon Voyage!
My journey to this fascinating museum began with those beautiful words that I read at the entrance of the Amsterdam Diamond Museum. More than diamond I have always loved the story of its becoming!
I met colors, flowers, and art while walking along the corridors of the beautiful exhibition named Bouquets To Art in the de Young Museum, one of the Fine Arts Museums in San Francisco.
Bouquets to Art is an annual floral exhibition hosted by the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.
Florists, designers, and garden clubs are invited to present floral interpretations of works in the museums’ permanent collections, and the floral displays are presented in juxtaposition with the works that inspired them.
Bouquets To Art - A unique floral summertime exhibition in San Francisco Click To Tweet
The purpose of a museum or an exhibition is not about conveying information (which is a commodity in this information age) but invoking emotion from within, make a basis for reflection and let the visitor grasp the real significance of the situation. The whole idea is to present an experience. I had one such memorable experience when I entered the permanent exhibition – Defending Human Dignity by Gringo Cardia, a Brazilian graphic designer and an artist inside the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum in Geneva, Switzerland.
The Louvre is the world’s largest museum. It is located in the city of love, Paris, which is of course the capital of France! It has 35,000 objects on display over an area of 72,735 square meters. On a chilly morning in March, when I entered the Louvre, the world’s second most visited museum, I realized that this is a kind of place where one can immerse oneself in great contemplation while looking at the works of artists who have risen to great heights.
The incandescent Sunday morning of 7th December 1941 on the shores of O’ahu started like any other day but ended in despair. The morning stillness was broken by the roar of Japanese aircrafts. It was a surprise military strike by the Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii territory. “Tora! Tora! Tora!” were the Japanese code words that signaled the surprise is complete; The first wave of low flying planes attacked just before 0755 and the second wave struck an hour later. By 0955 the attack was over and so were the lives of thousands. Today, 7th December 2022, exactly 81 years after the attack, I am remembering the day of infamy.
