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Sao Paulo, Brasil

Just returned from Brasil. Aside from all of the family stuff, I did have time to visit some museums, see a little Brazilian culture in Sao Paulo. I went to the Museu do Ipiranga (second image above). Originally, it was a palace for Dom Pedro I, who proclaimed Brazil's independence from Portugal in 1822 and became Brazil's first Emperor. Today it is filled with artifacts ranging from statutes to kitchenware to early twentieth century firetrucks.

Next, I went to the Museu da Lingua Portugeusa (Portuguese Language Museum). It is housed in a building that was the first train station in Brazil (last image above) and explores the origins of the Portuguese language. The highlight was an exhibit on the first floor based on the classic Brazilian novel by Joao Guimaraes Rosa called Grande Sertao. Within the exhibit hangs enlarged canvas pages from Rosa's original manuscript that are on a pulley system with bags of sand tied to the other end. You pull on the string and the bag goes up while the page comes down so you can read it. There are also passages from the book on piles of bricks, drums of water and the floor. The exhibit is interactive, actually letting the visitor touch, pull, look and climb.

Lastly, I went to the Museu de Arte de Sao Paulo (MASP). This is strictly an art museum and one of the best I have visited. Not only did it have considerable Brazilian art, it also had works from Van Gough, Cezanne, Manet, Monet, Rembrandt, etc... One of my favorites was Italian painter Amadeo Modigliani's "Lunia Czechowska" from 1919 (first image above). I also got to see the Pirelli Collection which consists of photographs of Brazil from many different Brazilian photographers. Check out the museum's website at: http://masp.uol.com.br/ and Wikipedia's page about the Portuguese Language Museum at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museum_of_the_Portuguese_Language