[QUOTE=Ice Wolf]
Te Papa Tongarewa in Wellington. The time I visited, the greeter remarked how she didn’t like the job, and I didn’t see anything that spectacularly justified my tax contribution. I’ve been told by some to give it another chance, and I might do – but it certainly didn’t thrill me first time out.
[/QUOTE]
Agreed. A fun fair in a shopping mall. Wait until the earthquake and it all disappears under Lambton Quay.
Wait a minute!
I like Henry Ford/Greenfield Village.
But I despise the Pro Football Hall of Fame. :eek:
There are some beauties explained here although none are in Florida. Still several are in the US or nearby:
Kansas Barbed Wire Museum
International Spy Museum Washington
Texas Prison Museum
Museum of Bad Art Massachusetts
Museo de Los Momias
The Conspiracy Museum in Dallas was pretty bad.
Add the Cannabis Museum to the Sex Museum in Amsterdam for dullness. It’s just one room, with some lame-ass exhibits of smuggling tactics, and photographs of plants.
The only thing going for it was the Californian hippy in the back, offering free hits off a vaporizer.
[QUOTE=ralph124c]
…-the Museum of Science, Boston, MA (some of the exhibits haven’t changed in 40 years)
-…
[/QUOTE]
I’m going to back ralph up here, sort of. I’ve thought about starting a thread on this subject in fact.
I first went to the Museum of Science in Boston in 1978 when I lived in New York. As a science nerd I thought it was great. There were all sorts of handles to crank and buttons to press, and cool machines and contraptions would demonstrate various scientific and engineering principles.
In the years since, especially the last few years when I’ve gone many times with my young son, I’ve been disappointed to the point where I don’t think we are going to renew our membership when it lapses. It seems like at some point in the last 30 years the powers that be at the MOS decided to make all their exhibits INTERACTIVE, which they have chosen to interpret as: “Attached to a (usually broken) computer”.
Now you go in and mobs of kids are running from one (broken) computer to another, where they pound the keys for a few minutes before they move on to the next broken computer. On the rare occasions when the computer seems to be working properly, the lesson is so poorly designed that even I (I’m an adult with a science background) have trouble understanding what I am supposed to take away from it.
The animal dioramas? I still love those but I recognize I might be in the minority there.
You can put me in the group of people who thinks the MOS has gone downhill.
[QUOTE=Smeghead]
I’ve been to Keswick in England twice, and missed the Pencil Museum both times. I kind of regret it. I’ve actually heard good things.
[/QUOTE]
A Pencil Museum? I’m there. Sounds odd and intriging.
I have to say the Detroit Institute of Arts is very dull. It is like the garage sale works of all the major world museums dumped their crap there and Detroit got it.
I haven’t been there since the remodeling. And I haven’t been there in 15 years ( except for the thingie they did for Van Gogh, which was really nice.) but, it sucks.
My husband and his buddy loved the Air and Space Museum in DC, whilst us girls were dead bored. But, the Toaster Exhibit ( very, very small, like 10 toasters and not far from some cafe/basement gift shop.) was utterly fascinating to us.
Making toast is far more interesting. Space travel, not so much.
Even if you’re a Tom Mix fan, the Tom Mix Museum in Dewey Oklahoma is pretty dull.
Link provided because I suspect some of our younger Dopers have never heard of “Hollywood’s first Western megastar”.
In Gig Harbor Washington there’s a city historical museum. The shoreline of Puget Sound is almost entierly pebbles, so in the early 1900’s Gig Harbor had a contest to see who could find the most perfectly spherical rock. The winner was the museum’s main attraction.
[QUOTE=bouv]
Someone will hate me for this, but the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.
Good GOD, art is so mind numbingly boring, I don’t know how anyone can stand it. I mean, how many fucking paintings of Jesus or different saints can you look at and still be impressed?
[/QUOTE]
Que?
The last time I was in Montreal, the current exhibition at the Musee des Beaux Arts was a retrospective of classic Disney movies. The curator created separate areas for each of the classic Disney movies, each of which combined original animation cels with the concept art (gorgeous) and various other works of art that inspired the design for each of the movies.
Easily one of the most accessible art exhibits I’ve seen in years - perhaps I’m biased as I’m something of an art gallery junkie, but this was the kind of thing that even kids seemed to be enjoying… and not a single Jesus in sight, I assure you.
If you were to give me the option of travelling to Montreal to see an exhibit there, or staying at home in Toronto to go to the Art Gallery of Ontario, Montreal would win hands-down. Their temporary exhibitions are always top-notch.
[QUOTE=Cerowyn]
I’ve never been to the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto, so I can’t claim that it’s particularly dull. I’ve never been interested enough to go, though.
[/QUOTE]
As someone who loves the Bata enough to volunteer a couple of hours on a weekly basis, I have to object to that statement.
The quality of the exhibitions does tend to be inconsistent, but most patrons who are dragged in kicking and screaming (usually men) by friends/family/spouses (usually women) are usually surprised to discover how interesting the topic of footwear can be. I do have to admit that the current exhibits aren’t really turning my crank as there isn’t a single 20thC shoe on display, but in the past two years we’ve had some jaw-droppingly gorgeous stuff on display including an entire exhibition of 20thC designer shoes.
And hey, who else in the world can claim to have Napoleon’s socks on display at this very moment? Hmmmm?
Surprisingly, the Museum of Science in London. I expected to be blown away by the most brilliant minds of the heart of the British Empire, but most of the exhibits were 70’s-looking kitsch. The photography exhibit outside was much more interesting.
The Museum in Edinburgh was way better. I could get lost in it for days and not care.
The Tasmanian Wool Centre is exactly as dull as you’d think. Not even any shearing demonstrations.
[QUOTE=asterion]
The UFO Museum in Roswell. I’ve been there twice, once as an unhappy teenager on a family vacation (coming back from Carlsbad), and then again recently on a trip to Carlsbad with my girlfriend (which makes a lot more things palatable.) A lot of it is rather boring and it can even be hard to just make fun of it.
[/QUOTE]
You beat me to it. Its a shame because it takes itself too seriously.
At least they let us bring our dogs in.
Coincidence? I THINK NOT!!
[QUOTE=Scissorjack]
Agreed. A fun fair in a shopping mall. Wait until the earthquake and it all disappears under Lambton Quay.
[/QUOTE]
Reckon! Excellent description, Scissorjack. I’ll remember that one, cheers.
[QUOTE=cmkeller]
Coincidence? I THINK NOT!!
[/QUOTE]
It’s that damned military-industrial-CIA-KGB-Cuban-French-Algerian-Secret Service-Mafia-Castro-gay transvestite cabal, I tell ya!
The National Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio. If you’re really into airplanes and fascinated by the tech specs about each one, you’ll love it. It’s a bunch of enormous hangers filled with literally hundreds of planes.
If you are sane, and get bored after the first couple dozen planes and sort of wish there was some indication of why these planes were so important, or what the tech specs mean, or anything at all like that, you’ll want to claw your eyes out. (My father and sister are in the first category. I am in the second. It was horrid.)
[QUOTE=NinjaChick]
The National Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio. If you’re really into airplanes and fascinated by the tech specs about each one, you’ll love it. It’s a bunch of enormous hangers filled with literally hundreds of planes.
If you are sane, and get bored after the first couple dozen planes and sort of wish there was some indication of why these planes were so important, or what the tech specs mean, or anything at all like that, you’ll want to claw your eyes out. (My father and sister are in the first category. I am in the second. It was horrid.)
[/QUOTE]
Oh. I’ve been wanting to go there. Maybe I won’t drag Mrs. Bayard along.
I have to agree the Boston MOS leaves much to be desired for. It’s been maybe three years since I was last there, but it seemed pretty much the same as when I went when I was seven. I thought it was cool as a kid, but dull as an adult.
Although I’ve been spoiled by the MFA. Most of the other art museums I’ve been to leave me with a “that’s it?” feeling.