Visit Hundreds of Museums Without Ever Leaving Home

Visit Hundreds of Museums Without Ever Leaving Home By Christine Cutler

Photos (L-R) The Lourve, Paris, France; The O’Keeffe, Santa Fe; The Hermitage, St. Petersburg, Russia; All ©Chris Cutler

Being stuck at home is not fun whether you are sick or not. If you have some time on your hands, instead of letting the kids spend hours watching cartoons or playing video games, let them take a virtual tour of museums and galleries around the world. More than 500 international museums teamed up with Google to offer you a look at their exhibits no matter where you are.

This list is in no way complete. You can click on the link to get to a virtual tour or visit the Google Arts & Culture page to access more than 1300 collections.

North America The High Museum of Art—Atlanta The Museum of Fine Arts—Boston Dallas Museum of Art—Dallas The Detroit Institute of Art—Detroit The Alberta Foundation for the Arts—Edmonton, Alberta, Canada The JP Getty Museum; Los Angeles Museo Nacional de Arte—Mexico City, Mexico Museo Frida Kahlo—Mexico City, Mexico The Metropolitan Museum of Art—New York City The Studio Museum in Harlem—New York City O’Keeffe Museum—Santa Fe, New Mexico Museo Arocena—Torreon, Mexico The National Gallery of Art—Washington, DC The National Museum of Women in the Arts— Washington, DC The US Holocaust Memorial Museum—Washington, DC

Europe Rijksmuseum—Amsterdam, The Netherlands The Acropolis—Athens, Greece Accademia di Belle Arti di Bologna—Bologna, Italy The Royal Museum of Fine Art—Brussels, Belgium Uffizi Gallery—Florence, Italy The National Museum in Krakow—Krakow, Poland National Gallery of Art—London, England The Lourve—Paris, France The National Gallery—Prague, Czech Republic The Hermitage Museum—St. Petersburg, Russia

Asia Today Art Museum—Beijing, China Our Place—Auckland, New Zealand National Gallery of Australia—Canberra, Australia Bridgestone Museum of Art—Chuo City, Japan Hong Kong Museum of Art—Hong Kong National Gallery of Modern Art—New Delhi, India Art Gallery New South Wales—Sydney, Australia National Palace Museum—Taipei, Taiwan Tokyo Fuji Art Museum—Tokyo, Japan Center for Art, New Ventures & Sustainable Development (CANVAS)—Quezon City, Philippines

South America Colección de Arte Amalia Lacroze de Fortabat— Buenos Aires, Argentina Museo de Arte de Lima—Lima, Peru The Football Museum—São Paulo, Braˆl Museu Paulista—São Paulo, Brazil Museo de Artes Universidad de los Andes—Santiago, Chile

Africa TIRAZ widad kawar home for arab dress—Amman, Jordan Iziko Museums of South Africa—Cape Town, South Africa Doxandem Squad—Dakar , Senegal Rele Arts Foundation—Lagos, Nigeria National Museums of Kenya—Nairobi, Kenya

Dispatch from the U.S. COVID-19 Epicenter: Seattle By Nancy Mueller

Yesterday a travel pal reminded me that it had been just two short weeks ago that we had flown home after a visit to Vancouver Island. We had had quite the adventure making our way to Sooke Point, the southernmost tip of the island, arriving in the midst of galeforce winds. But we had no idea of the adventure awaiting us once we headed home to Seattle.

My colleague noted that just two short weeks earlier, kids were in school, she had been planning an April trip to France, and cars and buses were clogging freeways and city streets as usual. Yet, news reports had begun trickling in about an elderly patient who had contracted coronavirus at a nursing facility east of Seattle. By the end of that week, his death became the first known case of the new virus in the United States, sounding the alarm of a potential outbreak in our region. The sense of residents beginning to withdraw into self-quarantine became palpable overnight.

Initially, when colleagues across the country asked how things were going in Seattle, I responded that we were following CDC guidelines, washing our hands, going about our business as usual, though vast quantities of store supplies like toilet paper, water, hand sanitizers, and cold medicine had quickly vanished. What’s happened since then has been surreal.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared COVID-19 a pandemic, national sports events have been cancelled, and Seattle’s swagger as an unstoppable economic engine has been effectively put on pause as we grapple with the impact of emergency measures now in place: no public gatherings of more than 250 people and all public and private K-12 schools ordered closed in three counties until at least April 24th. As fears of a wider outbreak take hold, the Archdiocese of Seattle has suspended public Masses, Seattle Public Libraries have shut their doors, and businesses have followed suit at accelerating speed faster than I can write. Countless restaurants, the Space Needle, and Seattle Art Museums have all closed, and the Port of Seattle has canceled the first two cruise ship sailings of the season.

All that said, Seattle is no stranger to innovation and ingenuity. We are a city of scrappy individuals adept at adapting to changing fortunes and making the most of unexpected opportunities. Many of us are hunkering down for now, working from home r whenever possible, perhaps baking more cookies and cooking more comfort foods than normal, while keeping one eye on the local and national news. We continue to take personal safety measures, washing hands even more often and enthusiastically than just two weeks a go, minimizing contact with friends and colleagues, and scooping up any supplies that we can still find in neighborhood stores.