By Helen Cherry
Guest Blogger

Why is it so rare that the bronze statue of Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius survived intact to the present day? What do the paintings inside the coffin of Nesykhonsu reveal about Egyptian life? And, what can you learn about cultural beauty standards by examining the Ejagham headdress in the museum’s African collection?

These mysteries and others can be explored in the museum’s new audio tour, which premiered with the re-opening this summer of our first-level 1916 galleries. The tour provides a new way to experience the museum’s ancient, medieval, and African collections.

The Cleveland Museum of Art needs your help! If you’re in the Cleveland or Akron area, here’s your chance to talk to CMA, tell us your thoughts, and help us plan an upcoming exhibition.

Selected individuals will be invited to participate in one of the discussion meetings taking place in April throughout the area. As a thank you, participants will receive a CMA prize pack, including a $25 Amazon.com gift card!

It's official: More than 50,000 people have visited the Cleveland Museum of Art to see Paul Gauguin: Paris, 1889.

In recognition of this milestone, Michael, Danielle and Jaden Cosgrove, along with their guests Bill and Sandy Ladebue, received free tickets to the exhibition, as well as a $50 gift certificate to a local French restaurant. The Cosgroves are from the Cleveland neighborhood of West Park, while the Ladebues were in from Pittsburgh to visit and catch the show.

On the morning of December 31, the museum reached another exciting milestone: We welcomed our 300,000th visitor this year.

If you haven’t been hiding underneath a rock you’ll know that this past year has been a really exciting one for the museum.  We opened up the East Wing with a fantastic party and gave people even more reason to come visit us.  We had some really great exhibitions like Friedlander, Art and Power in the Central African Savanna, Streams and Mountains Without End and of course Gauguin: Paris, 1889.  And, most recently, we got the okay to go ahead with another phase of our renovation and expansion project (you can read about it

Have you ever wanted to try your hand at creating art after viewing works in the museum?  We thought you did, and that’s why we’ve included an art exploration gallery in the Gauguin: Paris, 1889 exhibition.

Have you ever had a question about a piece of art you’ve seen or read about and you don’t trust Wikipedia with the answer?  Thankfully, the CMA is always here to help.  Over at the Ingalls Library our “Ask a Librarian” staff is waiting to hear from you and to answer any questions you may have about the museum or the art world.

Thank you to everyone who participated in our contest and congratulations to Blaire Bomber for winning the drawing!  She correctly answered that the first painting is the fake and the second is the real Vermeer.  For answering correctly and winning the drawing Blaire will be receiving a copy of Jonathan Lopez’s book The Man Who Made Vermeers.