STATE OF THE ARTS

The most creative global cities to elevate your mind-body-soul experience

- SONIA NAZARETH

Take me to high civilizations of forgotten beauty has frequently been my mandate to artisticallyrich cities. Artistic heritage contributes immensely to the well-being of communities. It mitigates the effects of the mass-produced, with museums and art institutions, standing as imaginative flags against cloned monopolies. The creative cities on this list, all allow through their tapestry of offerings, fresh ways of experiencing ourselves and our planet.

Canberra, Australia, Culture of Creativity

Driven by intentional living is Australia’s capital city, Canberra. This life-force can be witnessed in the quality of its public museums. The National Gallery, housed in a Brutalist building on the shores of Lake Burley, is home to one of Australia’s most valuable art collections. The over 155,000 works of art collection, include Australian art from the European settlement to the present day, along with some striking pieces from the world’s largest collection of Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander art. Highlights include “Blue Poles” an iconic work by Jackson Pollock, and the “Aboriginal Memorial” that comprises 200 decorated hollow log memorials that honor all aboriginals who died during white settlement.

A few pixie steps away, the National Portrait Gallery is an essential stop. Fortuitously, there’s nothing sedate about the portraits. The larger than life, the humble, the obscure are all represented through mediums as varied. Here a photograph. There a print. Everywhere, a miniature, caricature or a cartoon. And just as suddenly, a stately painting or sculpture. These go much beyond sedate images of politicians and monarchs, to tell the nation’s stories, through a representation of a cross-section of its population.