Arts & Culture


  • NEW ZEALAND CITY WAVES GOODBYE TO CONTROVERSIAL SCULPTURE
    by Staff - Perched on two fingers on the roof of the city art gallery in Wellington, New Zealand, the giant hand with an unsmiling human face has loomed over the city for five years. Some found “Quasi” disturbing, and now, after five years of provoking controversy and myriad emotions – from horror and revulsion to delight – among residents, the sculpture has been removed taken to a new home.

  • LOSE SOME. WIN SOME.: Rocked by Vienna cancellations, Swifties shake it off and flock to London
    by Staff - For Herve Tram, being a Taylor Swift fan isn’t just about the music. The 28-year-old computer network engineer from Paris sees himself as part of a community, one of the Swifties as they are known. So, when the pop superstar's shows in Vienna were cancelled last week because of a terror threat, Tram took a small personal step: He gave away two extra tickets to her upcoming concerts in London to two fans who missed the chance to see their guiding light in the Austrian capital.

  • MILAN MUSEUM TO FINALLY OPEN AFTER 50 YEARS OF DELAYS
    by Staff - Fifty-two years and 39 Italian governments after it was first envisioned, Milan’s Brera Modern will be inaugurated in the fall, officials have promised. An extension of the famed Pinacoteca di Brera, the new museum will house more than 100 contemporary art works that belong to Brera’s collection that have mostly been relegated to storage.

  • 12 TRENDS OF CULINARY TOURISM
    by Staff - The World Food Travel Association (WFTA), the world's leading authority on food and beverage tourism, has released its "2024 State of the Industry – Food & Beverage Tourism" report, which is available as a free download. The report is the WFTA's annual bellwether assessment and analysis of the food and beverage tourism industry (also known as culinary tourism or gastronomy tourism).

  • SPORTS TOURISM HIGH ON THE SCORECARD FOR CANADIANS
    by Staff - With the hockey playoffs and baseball season now in session – and the Summer Olympics and EURO 2024 only a few calendar page flips off – Flight Centre Travel Group (FCTG) says its research show that nearly one out of every two Canadians say they are likely to plan a trip focused on attending sporting events.

  • HOTELS THAT PLAY BALL FOR SPORTS FANS, AND OTHER ROAD TRIP TIPS
    by Staff - Baseball’s back! And for some, that means summer road trips to fun cities or famous diamonds like Fenway Park or Wrigley Stadium, sometimes paired with following their favourite teams, or perhaps just the love of the game. After all, sports and travel go together like peanuts and Cracker Jack.

  • PARIS PREPARING FOR INVADER: He comes, he glues, and disappears into the night
    by Staff - For the Paris Olympics, it could almost be a new sport: Score points by hunting down mosaics that a mystery artist who calls himself “Invader” has cemented to walls across France’s capital, the world, and even had carried aloft to the International Space Station.

  • THE SERIOUS DEBATE OVER DAVID’S DOODLE
    by Staff - Michelangelo’s David has been a towering figure in Italian culture since its completion in 1504. But in the current era of the quick buck, curators worry the marble statue’s religious and political significance is being diminished by the thousands of refrigerator magnets and other souvenirs sold around Florence focusing on David’s genitalia.

  • THE GREATEST SHOW ON SNOW: Never boring, meet the quirky sport of skijoring
    by Staff - Nick Burri clicks into his ski bindings, squats to stretch his knees and scans the snowy racecourse. Moments later, he’s zipping past a series of gates at high speed and hurtling off jumps. But it’s not gravity pulling him toward the finish line: It’s the brute force of a quarter horse named Sirius.

  • MAD ABOUT TRAD: Delightful Dublin is music to our ears
    by Michael Baginski - Since the age of four, when my mother first played the irrepressible song “Off to Dublin in the Green” by an obscure group called The Abbey Tavern Singers, I’ve been hooked on traditional Irish folk music.

  • SEVENTH HEAVEN: The world’s most luxurious shopping streets
    by Staff - When holidaying in the some of the world’s top cities, travellers can find themselves with an opportunity to take in (and load up on) some of the world’s most luxurious shopping streets – names that resonate on the big screen, in the pages of glossy magazines, and maybe in our dreams.  From the Champs-Élysées to Rodeo Drive, here are seven sensational streets where one can shop till they drop, and, with a little luck, maybe even mingle with the rich and famous.

  • FAMED NYC MUSEUM CLOSES NATIVE AMERICAN EXHIBITS
    by Staff - New York’s American Museum of Natural History is closing two halls featuring Native American objects starting Saturday, acknowledging the exhibits are “severely outdated” and contain culturally sensitive items.

  • DOING THE RIGHT THING: UK museums return artifacts to Ghana
    by Staff - The British Museum and the Victoria & Albert Museum in London are returning gold and silver artifacts to Ghana under a long-term loan arrangement – 150 years after the items were looted from the Asante people during Britain’s colonial battles in West Africa. The arrangement sidesteps UK laws that prohibit the return of cultural treasures to their countries of origin (famously including the Elgin Marbles to Greece).

  • FIDDLE ME THIS: Future Four Seasons Rome finds elusive Nero Theatre
    by Staff - Rome’s next luxury hotel has some very good bones: Archaeologists say that the ruins of Nero’s Theatre, an imperial theatre referred to in ancient Roman texts but never found, have been discovered under the garden of a future Four Seasons Hotel steps from the Vatican.

  • DISCOVERY CASTS MONA LISA IN A NEW LIGHT
    by Staff - The next time you’re gazing at the “Mona Lisa” at the Louvre in Paris, consider that beneath the subject’s exquisitely enigmatic smile, a new secret has been uncovered about the Leonardo de Vinci masterpiece.

  • THE BEAT GOES ON: Liverpool museum celebrates birth of Beatlemania
    by Staff - The phenomenon of Beatlemania screamed itself into existence 60 years ago in October 1963. Sixty years later, Liverpool’s The Beatles Story has released a new video that explores the phenomenon with first-hand accounts of those frantic fanatical days.

  • INDIGENOUS GROUP OF SEVEN: Morrisseau monument boosts N. Ontario tourism
    by Staff - Canada’s most famous indigenous artist, Norval Morrisseau, has a new monument in northwestern Ontario in the region he was born and raised. The installation at Nipigon's Bridgeview Lookout is part of the Lake Superior North Shore Tourism Project and consists of an interpretive panel below a metal bird airbrushed with photos of Morrisseau, which all stand on a wooden platform.

  • SEOUL WITH SOUL: Contiki launches first Korean trip
    by Staff - With Korean culture, from TV shows to pop music, Korean culture is at all-time in in interest around the world. With this mind, Contiki has announced its first ever trip to South Korea. The nine-day “South Korea Soul” itinerary begins and ends in Seoul and includes a high-speed rail journey to Busan, plus a stopover at Jeonju – the UNESCO World Heritage town known for its traditional ambience and local hospitality.

  • TWO VOICES STILLED: Tony Bennett and Sinéad O’Connor
    by Staff - Two wonderful voices have been silenced. Tony Bennett was just weeks short of his 97th birthday, and Irish singer and musician, Sinéad O'Connor who was just 56 died on Wednesday. Both thrilled audiences creating magic with their music and both were globally celebrated.

  • SOUNDS GOOD: Britain’s summer music festivals
    by Staff - Music festivals are synonymous with Britain, both singular and annual, and cover a wide spectrum from electronic music to classical and classic rock and roll. Some notable events, like Glastonbury, are in the books for 2023, but there are still plenty of tunes to come at a number of music fests across the country this summer.