Gulag Life At The KarLag Museum Of Political Repression

The heart of the KarLag museum is a series of full size dioramas, re-creations of what life was like in one of the prison camps, gulags. Call it the banality of evil.

When you arrive, have a seat for your identification card picture. Snap.

Maybe the doctor sees you for an evaluation. Or a horrible scientific experiment. Or both. Not your call. All this processing has you tired, we get it. Head for the bunks, grab something with the most straw.

You were surly? Isolation for you.

Good folks get to use the library. Bad folks get to use the hole.

A guard, not your friend. 

At The KarLag Museum Of Political Repression

Everyone knows about gulags and Siberia. Drop a banana peel on a street in Stalin's USSR, off you could go. Siberia wasn't the only place for prisoners, enemies, minorities, litterers. Stalin established a large network of gulags in Kazakhstan, near a town called Dolinka, way up on the Central Asian steppe, south by a few hours from Astana.

Kazakh gulags were established in 1931 and lasted until 1959. As many as 800,000 prisoners passed through the camps, working at construction, building munitions. Practically every German person from the captured Volga region was moved to Dolinka.

A museum was opened in 2011 in a former administrative building.

The museum is heavy on re-creation, if a bit bereft of actual artifacts. History starts with life before the gulags, focusing on who lived in the area, what they did for work. A Kazakh peeps and a woodworking shop. Nice stuffed monkey.

Bucolic, agrarian life, farm with a surprising mix of animals. Noah must have paid a recent visit.

A timeless annoyance, waiting for the husband to fix a flat.

First sign of the gulag state, a baby crib with wood block toy that spells out Stalin's name. Indoctrinate them early.

Religion Is Everywhere In Naples

Nobody does religious icons like the Catholics in Italy. OK, maybe Hindus in India bring it. Iconography is all over Naples, in churches, street side, alley shrines, in glass cases, everywhere. Don't even throw in the biggest saint, football star Maradona.

Everybody puts their favorite saint in a box. Here's Santi Domenico Soriano e Nunzio Sulprizio.

The Virgin Mary, getting dramatic. Upward lighting and plastic flowers do the trick. The handmade, casual shrines tucked into walls along streets are great. They are always a hodgepodge installation, a mix of icons, candles, offerings, and pics of those lost and remembered.

Another box, another saint. Looks tough. And cramped.

Jesus in a box details, gotta get the stigmata right.

No place is inappropriate for a shrine. Here is a little one, plopped on the retaining rocks in the harbor.

Enjoying The Naples Botanic Garden

The Naples botanic garden is a bit of a throwback. More urban, more a city park than modern, sprawling, giant collection of the world's species. It's a hidden gem within the busy, frantic city, a good place to get some quiet and enjoy a little flora. 

The offices, looking more like a Palladian villa.

Things are manicured, punctuated with paths and curves.

Zombie bust among the blooming rosemary.

More curves and a little Australian tree fern jungle corner.

The greenhouse, classically vintage.

Pleasing Plobjects At Plart

Naples, Italy seems like a good place for a museum devoted to all things plastic. The country has a history of creating bright, colorful, crazy objects, a perfect style for plastic materials.

Plart is a multi-functional place, a bit museum, a bit obsessive collection, some foundation, developmental work. A visit reveals a nice peek into all things plastic, old and new.

How about a vintage kitchen, filled with all of those space age objects that jolted the drudgery of food preparation into the jet age?

One room contains a sort of wavy, trippy trail of smaller object developments. Some of those early items, baby dolls, candle sticks. Something for kid and mom.

Plastics, they're hip, baby. A music theme installation. All accordion, record player, shellac discs, microphones and radios.

Local creativity. An up-cycle parade figure for the San Gennaro festival.

On to the swanky office, filled with lamps, file cabinets, ashtray, and iconic Olivetti typewriter.

Living The Life At The Museo Pignatelli In Naples

There are house museums and then there are house, villa museums. Pignatelli is definitely the latter. The sprawling, neo-classical pad was built by admiral Ferdinand Acton in 1826. He liked the mirror and bling look. German financiers, dukes and other rich peeps owned the place at one time or another. By 1952, the state owned the mansion and opened it up to the unwashed masses for a gander. We're game.

Columned view from the lawn.

Ballroom detail. There are those mirrors and gold bling trimming. Funky, oval room off of the ballroom. Nice wall paintings.

The main living room. Chandelier, candelabra light bulb changing must be a full time job.

Huge bathroom, ahead of its time. Suck it, HGTV. Some family history in profile portraiture on a wall.

Full bust viewing, thanks to one of the many mirrors.

Catching Great Art At The Capodimonte Museum

Italy always means Renaissance art treasures and the main museum in Naples, Capodimonte, does not disappoint.

First up: a biggie that blows the eyes away, a room full of Titian masterpieces.

Napoleon portrait with fancy sofa. Have a seat. The way to travel back then. The seggioli, or sedan chair.

The museum features some over the top, baroque apartment rooms. Care to dance?

Restoration work happening, delicate. Black marble sculptures, including a nice rendition of Michaelangelo's Moses. Original found in Rome.

It's not all stuffy Old Masters. How about some stuffy New Masters? Andy Warhol's take on the Mt Vesuvius eruption over Pompeii. Angry.

Naples And Its Religious Dioramas

It's kind of creche gone wild in Naples with dioramas on display in churches, figurines and set dressing available for sale on the streets. Everyone and their mother, probably especially their mother, must have a special creche set up somewhere. No matter the place, always good details.

The classic theme, baby Jesus' reveal party. "It's a God!"

Jealous onlooker. Snoozing with a live sheep blanket.

Leading a gaudy procession.

Expressive animals. Fowl and dogs are easily startled.

Back to that big party, alternate version. How about a silver doily to go with your nakedness?