London’s Tate Modern Museum (Bankside, London, England, SE1 9TG, UK; phone +44 20 7887 8888, www.tate.org.uk) opened its new, twisting-pyramid-shaped tower, the Switch House, on June 17. The 200-foot-tall, 10-story building, with a top-floor observation deck, increases by 60% the amount of art that can be displayed.
In the “Fashioning a Reign” exhibit, some of the dresses and outfits England’s Queen Elizabeth II has worn are being shown in three of her official residences.
• Until Oct. 2, the largest exhibit is in the State Rooms of Buckingham Palace (London; www.royalcollection.org.uk/visit/buckingham palace), open daily, £21.50 (near $29).
• Until Oct. 16 at Palace of Holyroodhouse (Edinburgh, Scotland; www.royalcollection.org.uk/visit/palace-of-holyroodhouse), open daily, £12.
Art, historical documents and other memorabilia highlighting the centuries of cooperation and friendship between France and the US are displayed in a salvaged, 17th-century château that was damaged during World War I in the city of Blérancourt, now the Franco-American Museum (Château de Blérancourt, 02300 Blérancourt, France; phone + 33 [0] 3 23 39 14 71, http://en.museefrancoamericain.fr).
The museum is scheduled to reopen in late September 2016 after a lengthy renovation and expansion. Open hours and entry fees have not been set yet.
Here are two temporary exhibitions at Barcelona’s Picasso Museum (Montcada 15-23, 08003 Barcelona, Spain; phone +34 93 256 30 00, www.museupicasso.bcn.cat/en):
• “Cubism and War. The Crystal in the Flame,” Oct. 20, 2016-Jan. 29, 2017, focuses on three artists living in France during WWI — Picasso, Juan Gris and Diego Rivera — with 60 Cubist works from 1914 to 1919.
One rarely hears the phrase “affordable and convenient lodging” used in the same sentence with London. I had been dreading tracking down a hotel for our December 2015 visit when our English friends John and Jennifer Bradshaw gave us a great tip about the Paddington neighborhood, located in northwestern Westminster, northeast of Bayswater and west of Marylebone.
Visitors to the Longmen Grottoes near the city of Luoyang in Henan Province, eastern-central China, now can enter Kanjing Temple, which opened to the public on March 10.
Kanjing Temple, carved into a limestone cliff more than 1,000 years ago, contains 29 life-sized sculptures of Buddhist monks, now protected behind glass. Since 1953, the public has rarely been allowed into the temple for fear of damage to the artifacts.
In a position of strategic importance, Malta has often been the target of invading armies. Visitors can explore the history of the Mediterranean island’s defensive buildings at the Fortress Builders Fortifications Interpretation Centre (St. Mark St., Valletta, Malta; phone +356 21228594, http://thefortressbuilders.weebly.com).
Housed in a fortified former warehouse of the Knights of Malta, the center exhibits multiple reproductions, in miniature, of historic and still-standing fortifications on Malta plus artifacts from Malta’s forts and descriptions of siege warfare.
Pablo Picasso was the most famous and — OK, I’ll say it — greatest artist of the 20th century. Before he was 30, Picasso had revolutionized the art world. And that was just the beginning.
A Spanish expatriate, cocreator of Cubism and devoted womanizer, Picasso left an amazing legacy in his wake. In the course of his long life (he died in 1973 at 91), Picasso moved from Spain to Paris to the south of France. Every locale that he called home has claimed him as a native son, with museums big and small devoted to his masterpieces.
In Latvia, more than 1,000 bells are displayed in the Museum of Bells in the old stable house of the 15th-century Blankenfelde Manor (Jelgava district, Vilce parish, Blankenfelde, LV-3026, Latvia; phone +371 27810348, http://blankenfeldes muiza.lv/en).
From around the world, the bells vary in age, style and material — commemorative bells, figural bells, gongs and even bells recast from metal from Lenin monuments. Including a tour, a museum visit costs €3 adult or €2 senior or student, and you must call in advance.
