10 Most Incredible Private Art Museums

Travelers and tourists always try to find places around the world that abound in the cultural, traditional and folk heritage of a country they are visiting. Besides vising archaeological sites, the best place to study the history, art and culture of a country are the museums. For instance ask  me which museum I would like to visit if I get a chance, my choice would be the Smithsonian Museum of Science and Technology, New York USA - a museum that abounds in all the scientific inventions since time immemorial. 

Some of the private museums

But there is a different kind of museums - the private museum, owned by people privately that have collection of artifacts and other valuable historic objects and paintings in possession of an individual or a family. The best thing about these museums is that these are quieter than the usual museums which over burst with museum enthusiasts and tourists specially during hot tourist and holiday seasons.

These museums generally are based on one theme, owing to the taste of the owner and his special collection. There are such gem-like collections in every corner of the globe. Some are hiding in plain sight, in well-known capital cities, while others are sequestered away in remote settings that require a sense of adventure—or, at least, a reliable GPS—to find. And some, like pop star George Michael’s Goss-Michael Foundation in Dallas, are the culmination of a collector’s particular obsession (in this case, contemporary British art), while others, like the famed Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia, span a range of eras and genres. Places like the Salvador Dalí Museum in the Surrealist master’s hometown of Figueres, Spain, offer a comprehensive paean to a single artist, says Emma Sloley at Mashable.

I recently came across a collection of ten such museums as compiled by Mashable and I thought to share with my readers - an information that may come handy if any happens to be around these places and the information may take one to these special places to enjoy and admire the collector and the owner for his/her taste and for sharing the collection with others.

These ten museums are:

1. Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, Italy
2. Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia
3. Beyeler Museum, Basel, Switzerland
4. The Dalí Theatre-Museum, Figueres, Spain
5. Goss-Michael Foundation, Dallas, Texas
6. Hess Collection, Napa, California
7. MALBA, Buenos Aires, Argentina
8. Mathaf, Doha, Qatar
9. Miho Museum, Shiga, Japan
10. MONA, Hobart, Australia

Read more about each these museums and their specialties at:: Mashable

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The Arnold Schwarzenegger Birth House Museum

A large section of travelers is always attracted to historical places, archaeological ruins and museums when they  are on their traveling spree. Given to me, I would go to the Smithsonian Institute of Science and Technology as it houses almost all known inventions in original. There are many other museums that abound the world which are specific to one subject or theme, like the Telephone History Museum in Moscow, the Quran Museum and Carpet Museum in Tehran, the Sikh Era Relics section in Lahore Museum, Museum of Broken Relationships - Zagreb, Croatia, and many more.

Arnold unveiled a bronze statue of his Mr. Universe days when inaugurating museum dedicated to him

But how would you like to visit a museum dedicated that muscular giant who once thronged the action movies, specially the Terminator series? Yes, I am talking of Arnold Schwarzenegger and the museum dedicated to him in his native country Austria. 

The museum, as a tribute to a man of the soil by the Austrians was inaugurated July 2011 last year by none other than the man himself - Mr Arnold Schwarzenegger. While inaugurating the museum, Arnold pulled a string to unveil a bronze statue of a young Arnold flexing in the skintight trunks of his Mr. Universe days.

The Schwarzenegger's House turned museum where Arnold lived from 1947-66

The museum is housed in the native house of Schwarzenegger family in the village of Thal, near the city of Graz, where Arnold lived from 1947 to 1966. A plaque by the door reads "Arnold Schwarzenegger's Birth House Museum." It is another thing that Arnold was born not in the house but a nearby hospital. But the house is the one where a crying and frowning would-be body builder child arrived straight from the hospital - a house that shaped his body building future, that was a cue for much greater glories in the Hollywood and US political scene. 

In 1947, the village of Thal was a humble beginning for the young Arnold as it did not have modern facilities or even the basic facilities like electricity and gas. Thus the house still preserves its original pit toilet, and a 1950s kitchen, with a washstand and jugs for collecting water.

Steel bed of young Arnold under photographs studded walls

The museum houses Arnold's first barbell, which probably formed the basis of young Arnold's quest to become a body builder. Besides there are photos of a young 'Arnie' as he is lovably called, with his parents and siblings,his childhood metal bed that he slept on as a youth and a Harley Davidson motorbike from one of the Terminator films, a sword from Conan the Barbarian, besides  trophies and photographs from his early days of bodybuilding. 

Harley Davidson from one of Arnold's Terminator movies

There are life size massive "Terminator" statues which brought glory and fame to this muscular giant actor, now turned politician. Though he has left Austria for good for seeking glory and fame in the USA, his native Austrians still love and adore him.They have in the museum a model of the wooden desk he used while California's governor.

Arnold's office as California's governor has also been replicated in the museum

There are many statues and photographs, artfully decorated in various parts of the museum like the one's shown below:

Arnold personaly explained the background of some of his photos to visitors

 

Amused Arnold touches his giant life size bronze statue outside the museum 

If you are one of Arnold's fans and happen to be in Austria sometimes, do make your plans tailored for a visit to the Arnold Schwarzenegger Birth House Museum in the village of Thal. You would feel as if Arnold is here, somewhere....

Photos source: Funzug

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Telephone History Museum, Moscow

Source: Funzug

If you happen to be visiting Moscow and are interested in history of various inventions and patents, you should not miss visiting the Telephone History Museum, which has been established by "Mastertel." The museum is located at the company's headquarters, where telephones of different world leading telephone producers of 1876-1970 are displayed. Till you go to Moscow, herein under is a pictorial of the inside of the museum to compel you to see these rare telephones by actually going to this unique museum. ATEA desk telephone, 1948, Antwerp. A Bell desk telephone, 1890, USA. An L. M. Ericsson (Lars Magnus Ericsson) telephone, 1895, Sweden. This telephone with an inductor call became the company's trademark. The common people called it "skeleton-telephone". It was widely used in Europe (including Russia) and in the United States, at social infractructure facilities and in apartments. A Siemens desk telephone, 1878, Germany. This telephone was made of wood and was simultaneously used as a microphone and a receiver. When one of the interlocutors was speaking, the other one had to keep silent. The two of them could not speak at the same time. At first the telephone had no ring. It was used by German postal authorities. A Siemens & Halske (Siemens) desk telephone, automatic telephone system, model ZBSA 11, 1910, Germany.

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Landmarks and Parks of Tehran

I stopped short of discussing landmarks and the beautiful parks of Iran in my last post as it was getting out of my hand. I never wanted to prolong it any further, lest the interest of the readers was lost.

At that time, the best landmark of Tehran was the Azadi Square (top right in the photo). Actually its name was Shahyad Tower, when it was built to commemorate the 2,500th anniversary of the once great Persian Empire in the Shah of Iran’s reign. After the Islamic Revolution in 1979, its name was changed to Azadi (freedom) Tower. Beautifully lit at night, it can be seen from miles apart. Whenever driving at night, it always served as beacon for direction keeping. Now I hear that another impressive tower by the name of Milad Tower has been added to Tehran’s skyline, which overshadows the Azadi Tower to an extent. But I really cannot comment on it any further as I haven’t seen it except in photographs, in which it looks impressive and pragmatic.

Apart from this, there are many museums and cultural centers. A number of erstwhile royal palaces have now been converted into tourists sites (though expensive items, paintings and furniture has been removed) and are centre of attraction of anyone visiting Tehran, and so for us as well. These palaces included the Golestan Palace, Niavran Palace and Saadabad Palace. The famous Peacock Throne of the kings is placed in the Golestan Palace. We also “roamed” in the vast green lawns of Niavran Palace, where once tourists like us could not even dream of entering. Beside palaces, there are a number of museums that include the Carpet Museum, Museum of Contemporary Art, Quran Museum and Painting Museum. Carpets are the specialty of Iran and one can see the most expensive, exotic, minutely woven and ultra big carpets displayed in the Carpet Museum, which was closer to the Park-e-Laleh. The Art Museum had some masterpieces from Picasso and Van Gogh, said to have been chosen by Empress Farah Deeba.

Teheran has wide roads and “Utu-baans – a Persian translation of the German Autobahn.” Beside many others, there were two that would interest us Pakistanis. These were the Bozarg Rah-e-Muhammad Ali Jinnah (Muhammad Ali Jinnah Expressway – the founder of Pakistan), and Iqbal Lahori Street in Eastern Tehran (the national poet of Pakistan Dr Allama Muhammad Iqbal had his initial poetic work written in Persian and is still revered as a great poet in Iran and his poetry is taught in schools and colleges. Although born in city of Sialkot, he had his higher education from Government College Lahore, where he was on the faculty later on as well. Perhaps for this association, he is known as Iqbal Lahori in Iran).

If I am allowed to say that Tehran is nothing without its parks, I may not be very wrong. Besides Park-e-Laleh (that I mentioned in my previous post) there are more than 800 small, medium and large scale parks spread all over Tehran, of which Park-e-Millat, Park-e-Niavran and Jamshediah Park are the major ones. I along with my family was a regular visitor of Park-e-Laleh and Park-e-Millat.

Almost on every Sunday, like most of the Tehranites, I would also take my family to either of these two parks to spend the day. And the best thing was that despite being visited by thousands of visitors, there would be no litter left behind by anyone. That’s something unbelievable. There were some fine restaurants in these parks where one could enjoy the traditional Iranian cuisines. Park-e-Millat is the largest of all parks in Tehran. In the imperial times, Park-e-Millat was known as the Shahansahi Park (the Imperial Park). There is a big lake which looks majestic at sun sets, with the reflection of Alborz Mountains. There were boats to enjoy the lake rides. The park has elaborate amusement facilities for the visitors which includes skating lanes, snack bars and coffee shops and a small area with birds in cages. There also is a horseracing club adjacent to the park. I am told that the park has now home to the first musical fountains in Tehran, established in 2008, like that of the Dubai Mall.

Closer to Park-e-Millat is located the Tehran international Fair grounds, where exhibitions of international level are held. I once went with a friend, a geologist from Pakistan who later died in a helicopter crash in Iran, to a book fair and was fascinated to see the interest shown by the Iranians in the books and other AV equipment and aids.

Sandwiched between the Carpet and Contemporary art Museums, Park-e-Laleh (pictured top and bottom left above) was more frequented by us as it was closer to our house. We would walk down to the place in the evenings to enjoy the lush green park with a huge fountain in its centre. There was a Kangaroo at one of its entrances, which is centre of attraction of my sons. No sooner it started to become visible, both of them would leave us and rush towards it and sit in its lap. Chalo Kababs used to be our favourite dinner, followed by delicious coffee ice-cream. On our first snow fall, we rushed to the park and enjoyed the snow fall right there in the open. I would never forget that (though on our way back we found our car to be covered with a heavy sheet of snow and took quite a while to remove it and drive back home).

Well, that’s all for now – but my description of Tehran is far from over. I would write more about people of Tehran in particular and that of Iran in general besides describing the Shehr-e-Baazi (the Sports City) in my next post.

Related Reading:

My memories of Iran - Tehran

Isphahan - Nisf-e-Jehan

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