4 Traveling Exhibits You Don’t Want to Miss

Beautiful exhibits and interactive displays make visiting museums a fun and educational experience for kids and adults of all ages. Museums illustrate history, teach us about familiar and unfamiliar cultures, and help us appreciate different periods of art. While museums are typically home to specific galleries, they can also host artifacts or artwork that are on loan. Your local museums may even host traveling exhibits that offer temporary opportunities to view award-winning displays. The exhibits described below are making their way across the country and are definitely worth a visit if they come to your area.

The Art of the Brick

The Art of the Brick was thought into life by contemporary artist Nathan Sawaya who used more than one million LEGO bricks to fabricate the 100+ creations that make up this traveling exhibit. Sawaya explains, “The museum exhibition is accessible because it engages the child in all of us while simultaneously illuminating sophisticated and complex concepts. Everyone can relate to the medium since it is a toy that many children have at home.” The Art of the Brick, which CNN has declared one of the world’s “Must See Exhibitions,” is currently on display at The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. You can also consult the exhibition schedule to find out if the 20-foot-long Tyrannosaurus Rex or Sawaya’s interpretation of the Mona Lisa are coming to a museum near you.

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BODIES the Exhibition

Are you fascinated by how the human body works? BODIES The Exhibition uses an innovative preservation process that allows viewers to get an up close and informative views of skeletal, muscular, nervous, respiratory, digestive, urinary, reproductive, endocrine, and circulatory systems. Currently located in California, Nevada, and Georgia, BODIES features more than 200 actual human bodies and specimens that teach science, human anatomy, physics, and biology. The Exhibition also showcases the effect that disease and unhealthy life choices (such as smoking) have on the body and how the pulleys, fulcrums, and levers we know as muscles, joints, and bones let us function without even thinking about it.

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Math Alive!

Whether your student loves math or rolls their eyes at the idea of real world implementation, Math Alive! will inspire them through video games, sports, fashion, music, robotics, and other interactive experiences. Venues are broken up into “thematic areas,” that illustrate math in sports, environment, style and design, entertainment, video games, and robotics and space and “Real World Math… Featured Personalities,” which features game developers, robotics engineers, artists and designers, teachers, and more. Find a venue near you and start exploring Math Alive!’s online activities to get excited about math.

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Star Wars and the Power of Costume

The Smithsonian‘s traveling exhibit, Star Wars and the Power of Costume, is a display of fabric, form, color, and style that, together, convey the process for the creation of the costumes worn throughout the Star Wars films. The first traveling exhibition to focus exclusively on Star Wars costumes, The Power of Costume features 60 amazing pieces including the Stormtrooper costume from the first film as well as Padmé’s gowns and headdresses. Admission also allows visitors to view short films, slideshows featuring costume concept art, insights from Smithsonian curators, quotes from the actors, digital flipbooks with interactive content, and more. The exhibit will be accessible through 2020, so be sure to check The Power of Costume‘s itinerary for tour dates and locations.

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If there aren’t any traveling exhibits heading to your town or you just want a break from your local museums, try going on a virtual field trip. Many museums allow you to view their exhibits online and there are even TED Ed videos that feature specific museums. Do you have a favorite museum or exhibit that you frequent? Share in the comments below!

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Featured Image – The Art of the Brick