Carnegie Museum of Art

Today we took a 1.5 mile walk to Oakland to visit the Carnegie Art Museum. The art museum includes art from the impressionist and post-impressionist period and European and American decorative arts from the late seventeenth century to the present. The Hall of Architecture contains the largest collection of plaster casts of architectural masterpieces in America and one of the three largest in the world. There are replicas of the venus di milo, the winged victory, discus thrower among others. The marble Hall of Sculpture replicates the interior of the Parthenon. We spent a couple of hours wandering around the museum and then moseyed back home to Shadyside. We will probably be visiting again through the year since we have unlimited trips for the year with our "my museums" pass.

Visit to the Andy Warhol Museum

Today we went to visit the Andy Warhol Museum of Modern Art. The building looked to be Art Nouveau and is located just after the 7th street bridge near PNC Park. It consists of 7 floors with various works of contemporary / pop art, a mix of Warhol's work with other artists.

The museum was established in 1991 by the American family of the artist Andy Warhol and the Slovak Ministry of Culture. Until 1996 AWMMA was called The Warhol Family Museum of Modern Art.

The museum's Andy Warhol Permanent Exhibition consists of 160 Warhol works of art, most drawings and silkscreens, as well as Warhol memorabilia. Also displayed are works by Andy's brother Paul Warhola and his son James Warhola. The museum features prominently in the documentary Absolut Warhola, directed by Stanislaw Mucha.

Carnegie Museum of Natural History

We used our "My Museums" pass today to go to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History on forbes avenue near CMU. It sits on the site of the Art Musuem but we focused on the History Museum. There are a lot of dinosaur skeletons there right now making it a good place for kids, but we enjoyed it too. There were 3 main floors and what looked like a downstairs area for kids to interact with science. The museum had large display of rocks, minerals, gems and jewelery. It also had a large dinosaur exhibit along with animal / botanical exhibits from North America, Africa, Asia, etc. There were also rooms devoted to birds and butterflys, artic explorations, Native Americans, and Egypt (fun to see since we were in Egypt a few months ago). The museum is very nice, we had a good time and will probably revisit later in the year with our museums pass.

Welcome to Pittsburgh Items

We needed to do a few things to get us acquainted with a new city. The first thing we did was to get hooked up with a small company called "About Pittsburgh". They took us around the city and showed us some sights as well as potential neighborhoods to live in.

The second thing we did was to subscribe to Pittsburgh Magazine, which comes with 12 annual issues containing events, restaurants, and business profiles around town. It also has a yearly City Guide with business and restaurant listing (a thing to have around).

The third thing we did was to become a member of the Carnegie Museums for 2009. This includes the Art, Science, Natural History, and Andy Warhol Museums. We can go as much as we like in 2009, and also to hundreds of member museums around the country (more posts to come on this one).

We also have been been using Moon's guide to Pittsburgh, which has been also been very helpful in finding our way around.