Big, Bold, Beautiful Botero Exhibition at Opera Gallery in Ion Shopping Mall, Orchard Road, the centre of Singapore

 

Botero exhibition poster on a pillar in Ion shopping mall. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

An ad on a Pillar at level 2 in Ion attracted me. I had already seen three large, imposing, amusing statues by Botero in Singapore. 

An impressive, huge, horse stands near the entrance escalators to Buona Vista station in Singapore.

Botero's horse statue near Buona Vista MRT underground railway entrance, in Singapore. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright. 

The Botero statue of a plump bird is by the Singapore river waterfront. The bird is a peace dove. It stands on a plinth by the UOB Plaza by UOB building.

Picture by Dudva in Wikimedia.

Botero's big Bird statue in Singapore.

Adam and Eve, statues by Fernando Botero in Hotel Michael, near Crockfords Tower, Resorts Sentosa, in Singapore.

Is Botero, creator of oversize sculptures, an outsize man? Here he is.

n	Fernando Botero - portrait made during his stay in The Hague Botero
Date	7 December 2006, 13:25:32
Source	Flickr
Author	Roel Wijnants

If you are shopping for a museum, a hotel, a city planning department, or a collector with a large budget, you might want to visit and go on the Opera Gallery mailing list. They can also negotiate with artists for you.

Free Visits and Frequent Visits

Opera gallery have several galleries worldwide, where you can visit for free, and take your hosts or guests on holidays and business trips. The exhibitions change regularly, so you can go back. You might see one or two examples of your favourites from a previous exhibition plus a lot of new ones.

Singapore's Opera Gallery Exhibition on 20th and 21st century icons - until 30th October 2022

Opera Gallery entrance in Ion shopping mall, Singapore. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Circus Band by Fernando Botero. Opera Gallery in October, 2022.

The gallery in Singapore doesn't sell postcards or small gifts, unlike museum shops. If you are inspired by your visit to the gallery, love the statues, but have a smaller budget and want a small desktop statue by Botero, on ebay you can find a supplier of a small statue for yourself or a gift, at about three hundred or four hundred plus US dollars (add tax, shipping etc).

https://www.ebay.com/str/europeanbronzegoddess (For a small repro of, for example, a Botero cat.)

Opera Gallery is worldwide, in

USA

New York, Miami, Miami Bal Harbour, Aspen, 

UK

London, England 

MONACO

Monaco

SWITZERLAND

Geneva

THE MIDDLE EAST

UAE

Dubai 

LEBANON

Beirut 

ASIA

CHINA

Hong Kong  

KOREA  

Seoul

SINGAPORE

Art & Exhibitions in Singapore

On a sunny day, you can combine a visit to Opera Gallery with a tour of the Botero outdoor sculptures. If it's overcast, you can also visit a free art exhibition on level 4 of ION in Singapore at the ION Art Gallery. Or the exhibition of Barbie Dolls mentioned in my other post.

Botero Statues In South America

If you go to South America, many more sculptures by Botero are in Plaza Botero, Medellin, Colombia. Medellin is the second largest city in Colombia, after the capital, Bogota. Colombia is next door to Venezuela with a northern coast and can be reached by airlines or cruise ships. Add it to your wishlist. 

Botero statues are also in: 

Champs Elysee, Paris, France; 

Venice, Italy; 

Chicago, USA; 

Broadgate Circus behind Liverpool Street Station, London ECA, England;

I saw this Botero sculpture of the lady, near Liverpool Street Station in London, from the outdoor staircase above, where it was dwarfed by skyscrapers alongside, so it did not look as large and impressive as standing at the foot of the horse in Singapore.

Opera Gallery has an indoor gallery in Bond Street, London.

Also in Berlin, Germany; Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel.

Man on Horse, Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel.

Meanwhile, back in safe and sunny Singapore, even during a brief rainy afternoon shower, you have a free indoor art gallery to visit at Ion shopping mall, the Opera Gallery.

Opera Gallery, 2 Orchard Turn #02-16, ION Orchard, Singapore 238801

tel: +65 6735 2618

Email: spore@operagallery.com

Useful Websites

ARTIST & SCULPTOR BOTERO  WORLDWIDE

Video of Venus in London, England.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIBdV-0Xz44

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Botero

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Fernando_Botero

BOTERO In COLOMBIA SOUTH AMERICA

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Botero_Square

OPERA GALLERY IN ION, SINGAPORE

https://www.operagallery.com/event/fernando-botero-singapore

https://www.operagallery.com/

ION IN SINGAPORE

https://www.ionorchard.com/deal/883-tourist-exclusive-unlock-your-retail-dreams-2022

https://www.ionorchard.com/ion-art

The Botero exhibition is in Opera Gallery, Singapore, until October 30th 2022, every day 11 am to 8 pm.

Opera Gallery exhibition in October 2022. Artist Anthony James. Repose.

https://www.instagram.com/stories/highlights/17888361200642798/

ANGELA'S OTHER POSTS

http://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com/2019/10/horse-sculpture-by-fernando.html

Please share links to your favourite blog posts

Where Is Einstein's Home? Cities To See In Switzerland: Basel, Berne, Geneva, Lucerne, Zurich

Switzerland - which city to see?

Where Next?

Basel

On the north western border.
City Hall (Rathaus) red with murals, art museums.
Caricature & Cartoon Museum.
Other speciality museums in the city and surroundings are on: art, architecture, design, dolls houses, Jewish museum, toys, wine.

Berne
einsteinhaus
Einstein's home with his wife, where he wrote the theory of relativity, whilst working for the Swiss patent office.

Einsteinhaus living room. Photo from Wikipedia under Einsteinhaus. Public domain.

Geneva - water fountain, flower clock, Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum

Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum, Geneva.

Lucerne - chapel bridge with water tower, covered bridge with frescoes and plaques inside.

Photo author Simon Koopman in Wikipedia.

Zurich
Chagall Windows in Fraumunster.
Art Museum.
Riverside walk and parallel hillside shopping street.
Corbusier House and Corbusier furniture in museum.

Useful Websites

BASEL
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caricature_%26_Cartoon_Museum_Basel

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museums_in_Basel

https://www.tripadvisor.com.sg/Attractions-g188049-Activities-Basel.html

BERNE
https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Berne
GENEVA

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Red_Cross_and_Red_Crescent_Movement

ZURICH
Handy and detailed information on museums and food.
https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Zurich
wikitravel

https://www.zuerich.com/en

 Chagall Windows
https://www.zuerich.com/en/visit/attractions/chagalls-church-windows

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Chagall

 Corbusier House & Furniture
Corbusier Furniture
https://www.zuerich.com/en/visit/culture/museum-fuer-gestaltung-toni-areal#internal
https://www.zuerich.com/en/visit/attractions/pavillon-le-corbusier#internal
tripadvisor

 Multi-lingual Lunchtime Toastmasters Club
The International Lunchtime Toastmasters in Zurich
https://iltm.ch/

SWITZERLAND

1 Tourism
Airline etc
https://www.swiss.com/sg/en/

2 Switzerland
https://www.myswitzerland.com/en-sg/accueil.html

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer. See previous post on Zurich. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Where are Burgundy and Bordeaux wines from? And what is a c a n e l é ?

I went to a wine tasting of French wines. We merrily debated whether wine should accompany food, or whether food should accompany wine!

The tasting was organised by a wine tasting club, which holds meetings at the back room of the Fulham Wine Rooms (restaurant, bar and wine shop) in Fulham, London, England.

We arrived to find wine glasses ready and waiting on a numbered sheet. A side plate had the sharp blue cheese to contrast and sweet small cakes to go with the wines.

The sweet wines we tasted were from Sauternes and other places in the Bordeaux region of France. Sauternes is a village in the south-west of France, in the Sauternes region. The Americans use the word sauternes with a small s to mean a sweet wine resembling wine from Sauternes.

However, the French protect the term which can be used only to describe wines from that region.

Sauternes, Barsac, and Cadillac are all in Bordeaux, which means the border on the water, or the river or seaside.

I tried eight sweet wines at a wine tasting club, which met at the Fulham Wine rooms (described in an earlier post).

My favourite sweet wines, both from The Sampler, which has branches in Islington in North London, and Wimbledon in south London. The one which was best value (the cheaper of the two), cost £10. It was Ch. Inc Hilhs Liquoreux 2011 Saint - M a c a i r e AC, a 75 cl bottle.

It tasted too sweet against a blue Roquefort cheese, better matched with the c a n e l é.

(I have inserted spaces because a spell checker changes the words after I have finished.)

C a n e l é
The French word ends with an accent on the e, an acute accent, making the e sound like an ay, with you your voice rising as if asking a question 'eh?'

This is a French tiny cake, well cooked, supposedly flavoured with rum. (I could not taste the alcohol, but it was a sweet little cake.)

(Not to be confused with the similar sounding Italian cannoli which is a cannon-shaped rolled sheet of pasta, as used around a meat or spinach filling in canneloni.)

My other equal favourite of the sweet wines, also bought from The Sampler wine shop, cost £35 and was Ch. Lamothe-Guignard 2003 2me Grand Cru Classé Sauternes AC. However, we had two bottles of this wine and both tasted different, maybe from two different barrels. One looked pinker than the other, and one was more grape-y. I had the second quality bottle, in most people's opinion, but I thought it was still great.

However, on price alone, I think the other bottle was quite good enough, and a much better price.

Best value, 5 - cinq is French for five.

Compare the wines. They look different colours.

This is the dearer of my two favourites, £35, and it was everybody's favourite.

BURGUNDY
Burgundy is diagonally north west of France, towards Germany and Geneva in Switzerland. (I use the g in Burgundy, Geneva and Germany to link the three places.)

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.
Please bookmark and share links to your favourite posts.

Charlie Chaplin Museum Opened in Geneva, Switzerland

Great news for Charlie Chaplin fans and anybody living in or visiting Switzerland. Years ago I visited Switzerland and took a photo of the statue of Charlie Chaplin's statue in a plaza on the lakeside. He was born in London, married in the USA, and lived his last years in Switzerland with his long-lasting, last wife.

Films
I recall his films, such as the tramp, and the one about Hitler.  Wiki says: His first feature-length was The Kid (1921), followed by A Woman of Paris (1923), The Gold Rush (1925), and The Circus(1928). He refused to move to sound films in the 1930s, instead producing City Lights (1931) and Modern Times (1936) without dialogue. Chaplin became increasingly political, and his next film, The Great Dictator (1940), satirised Adolf Hitler.

Geneva and Switzerland
Geneva is known for its lake and elegant fountains.

Family
Two of his earlier wives were young and forced him to marry by claiming pregnancy. The loss of one child is said to have inspired his plot about the tramp and the little boy.

Charlie Chaplin (16 April 1889 – 25 December 1977) lived at the house with his wife Oona and eight children. His story is one of rags to riches. His mother went mad from syphilis and his father was drunk, and Little Charlie was in and out of the workhouse. Comedy must have been a refuge from his troubles, and his troubled life and childhood inspired his characters. Interesting to see how he created the character of the tramp, using ill-fitting clothes, and the moustache to make himself look older but without hiding his mouth.

Death and Grave
He died in his nineties. His body was stolen from the grave in Switzerland and ransom demands were made. The body was retrieved.

The Museum
 The opening of the museum in the former family home in Vevey was attended by his son Michael who is of retirement age.

You could make yourself a trail including the family of playwright Eugene O'Neill (father of Chaplin's wife Oona).

More Information
http://www.chaplinsworld.com an official website
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-360657 Announcement of opening of mueumse and description.
https://www.tripadvisor.com.sg/Attraction_Review-g198827-d246799-Reviews-Charlie_Chaplin_Statue-Vevey_Canton_of_Vaud.html
TripAdvisor describes how you can take amusing photos with the public landmark statue.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_O%27Neill
http://chaplinstamps.blogspot.sg (postage stamps featuring Chaplin)
http://www.biography.com/people/charlie-chaplin-9244327 (Website includes video biography)

Travel Trail
Wikipedia has photos of statues of Charlie Chaplin around the world including London, England; Ireland, Italy and Spain and Switzerland. Also a picture of pavement star. And several stills from his films.

Quotations
I also recall his quotations. My favourite is:
'Give me a pretty girl, a policeman and a park and I can create a comedy.'

More Quotations from Charlie Chaplin

Life is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but a comedy in long-shot.

We think too much and feel too little.

A day without laughter is a day wasted.

For a travel roundup of photo opportunities following Charlie Chaplin, here are the countries to visit in alphabetical order:

Ireland statue
Italy statue
Spain - statue
Switzerland museum in Vevey near Geneva.
UK Statue in London.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.