Nijmegen
Nijmegen is a city about 90 minutes by train east of Amsterdam. It's less than 20 miles from the German border. By Dutch standards it's a big city and has the customary church tower in the center, but I'm sure you've never heard of it. There are two museums I was interested in. One was the national bicycle museum which was closed due to a music festival. Just because there's a music festival in town, you can't find one person to open the door and take my 6 euro admission? Next was the Valkhof Museum. Roman history and contemporary art are slightly more important than bicycles so they were open. There were a lot Roman artifacts since Nijmegen was one of the northermost outposts of the Roman empire and they claim to be the oldest Dutch city. My favorite part of the museum was the inside because it was air conditioned while outside was insanely hot and humid. Two people died the day before from walking too much. 
My least favorite part of the museum (and this is a general rant against all museums) is the floor plan. Why can't there be one continuous flow through the museum? Would that be too easy? One rooms leads to two. One of those 2 leads to a third and fourth. When I'm done in the 4th room, I have to backtrack through rooms 3 and 2 to get to 1 which continues on to the rest of the exhibit!
I have mixed reactions to contemporary art. Some of it looks like nothing; some of it looks like crap. Some stuff looks interesting...but not interesting enough for me to have paid to see it. But every now and then, one of these modern creations impresses me.
This sculpture is called Falling Man.It's the artist's impression of what Michelangelo's David sculpture would look like if he was falling down. This really is a work of art, It's anatomically correct. It's a classical style. The only thing modern about it is the pose. Which made me wonder why aren't there more sculptures like this?
Labels: museums, netherlands
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