Almost every museum offers paintings and sculptures. With quirky, confusing and imaginative exhibitions, some museums amaze and baffle their visitors, or make them laugh
Gluten-free, please!
// Gluten-free versions of works by Wayne Thiebaud, Razzia, and Walt DisneyTo visit this exhibition, you don’t even have to leave your home. The Gluten Free Museum is an online museum on the Internet platform Tumblr and presents gluten-free versions of world-famous paintings, photos or film scenes. One finds van Gogh’s “Rest from Work” without the grain harvest, Cézanne’s “Still Life with Bread and Eggs” without bread or Lady and the Tramp’s romantic dinner without the spaghetti. Worth a visit not only for those with gluten intolerance!
Gluten Free Museum, Online-Museum, glutenimage.tumblr.com
Don’t take it so seriously
The association is called “Recycling of Surplus Thoughts.” It has made it a mission to share its quirky ideas and thoughts with the world and has been exhibiting them in the Nonseum since 1994. This includes wonderfully useless items such as the triple “umbrella for pessimists” or a “travel case for Bavarian sausage” (see photos). A collection of historical buttonholes shows a buttonhole from Napoleon’s tunic, enclosed in a plastic bag. Those who enjoy wordplay and thinking outside of the box will love this exhibition.
Nonseum, Herrnbaumgarten (AT), Dauerausstellung, nonseum.at
What’s love got to do with it?
First great love, then separation – the Museum of Broken Relationships shows all facetsA can of love incense that doesn’t work, a letter with ten reasons why a partner should stay, or an “ex-ax” for destroying a former lover’s furniture – following the Brexit negotiations, this museum in English York is collaborating with the Museum of Broken Relationships in Zagreb to exhibit items that were intended to save relationships, that ultimately ended them or that were even used for later revenge. Naturally, the exhibits include the stories behind them. Humorous, moving and authentic.
York Castle Museum, York (UK), Gastausstellung: Museum of Broken Relationships 22. März 2019 – 22. März 2020, yorkcastlemuseum.org.uk
Take a deep breath
Snoring – and, above all, inventing remedies for it – seems to have kept people awake through all ages. At the Museum of Snoring, visitors find exhibits hailing from various centuries, collected by the surgeon and sleep specialist Joseph Wirth. In addition to nose clips and mouthpieces, there are also anti-snoring medications and masks – a mixture of funny and somewhat disturbing.
Schnarchmuseum Langenholzen (Niedersachsen, DE) schnarchmuseum.de
Anything is possible
There are no limits to the imagination here. At this museum in Brussels, peculiar objects await visitors, such as a mermaid mummy, a room with 1,000 drawers, or a steampunk robot as a
selfie companion. Works by famous artists including Bosch, Breughel and Magritte are exhibited here as well – basically everything that’s fantastical, bizarre or surreal.
Musée d’Art Fantastique Brüssel (BE) fantastic-museum.be
More about the Hotels:
Romantik Hotel Alte Münze, Goslar (DE)
Romantik Hotel Villa Copis, Borgloon (BE)
