As we begin to plan #EuroBeerTrip16, recommendations of places to see are already flooding in. This year we are going to Berlin, Amsterdam and several cities in Belgium. We have already been to Brussels. We went a few years ago, but only for a day. This time we are going to dedicate two or three days to see as many places as we can. For example, we plan to spend an entire day at Brasserie Cantillon. Someone told us to visit Nüetnigenough. I am not sure where else we are going to go, but I like having a plan.
While on a recent trip to Savannah, Georgia, I read an article in American Way, the American Airlines in-flight magazine. The article was titled 5 Reasons to Visit Brussels’ New Millennium Iconoclast Museum of Art. We don’t frequent art museums at home, but some of my most font memories of Paris are visiting museums like Musée du Louvre and Musée d’Orsay.
The point of #EuroBeerTrip16 is beer, but we might find time to visit a museum. The 5 reasons we should visit this one are:
- MIMA’s home is inside the former Belle-Vue Brewery building, a hulking industrial edifice perched o the Brussels–Charleroi Canal, links Brussels’ history (and madness for beer) to its unrivaled passion for art.
- Eight galleries will spotlight once-marginalized artistic forms such as graffiti, graphic and tattoo art, punk and hip-hop music, and skate boarding.
- The museum’s first temporary exhibition, “City Lights,” highlights the works of five American artists, including work covering the walls and ceiling by Brooklyn muralist Maya Hayuk and larger-than-life paper collages by artists Momo and Swoon.
- Thanks to its central location, reasonable cost of living and a long history of supporting outside-the-box art forms, Brussels is currently amid a contemporary art boom, with a proliferation of studios, fairs and galleries. MIMA, however, is Brussels’ only dedicated contemporary art museum.
- MIMI sits adjacent to the MEININGER and Belvue hotels, which opened in 2013 and 2015, respectively, and is part of a broader city pan to energize the canal district for locals and the 30,000 visitors to the museum expects in its first year.
SOLD! Right out of the gate this place has ties to craft beer, and while I’ve never heard of Belle-Vue Brewery, the sheer history lesson would be worth it. It is #EuroBeerTrp16, after all!
We will be in Europe this September, so be on the lookout updates along the way. I can’t wait to drink a beer at the New Millennium Iconoclast Museum of Art. Cheers! (END WITH HOW THEY SAY CHEERS IN BELGIUM)
*The original list if compliments of Kimberly Lovato.
