With a 3 days weekend after a weekend of snow, everyone is in need of a reason to get out of the house – a perfect time to revisit one of the many great museums we have here in Pittsburgh.  Here is a run down of some exhibits that are not to be missed.

• Carnegie Museum of Natural History – Whales Tohorā – A whale of an exhibit about whales will be at the museum until May 2, 2010.
  • Tuesday–Saturday: 10 a.m.–5 p.m. , Thursday: 10 a.m.–8 p.m., Sunday: 12 p.m.–5 p.m. – The Museum will be open on Monday, January 18 – Martin Luther King Jr. Day
• Carnegie Science Center – Highmark  Sportsworks has reopened
  • Sunday – Friday 10 am – 5 pm, Saturday- 10 am – 7 pm
• Senator John Heinz History Center – Pittsburgh a Tradition of Innovation – a look at things that were created here in Pittsburgh including the Mr. Yuk sticker and the Big Mac.
  • Open 7 days a week 10am – 5pm

Often times museum employees “are artists who dedicate their days promoting the artwork of others and their nights & weekends creating artwork of their own.” Curators Laura Mustio and Nicole Rosato celebrate this fact with a new show, Behind Our Scenes, opening Friday night from 6-9PM at SPACE (812 Liberty Ave. in Downtown). Rosato herself is the Visitor Services and Volunteer Coordinator at The Mattress Factory, and the artists are all employees of some of the most well-known Pittsburgh cultural institutions: The Carnegie Museum of Art, Oakland; The Mattress Factory, North Side; The Andy Warhol Museum, North Side; Fe Gallery, Lawrenceville; Future Tenant, Downtown; Wood Street Galleries, Downtown. The show runs through February 13, 2010. Read a guest post by curator Nicole Rosato over at The Mattress Factory’s blog!

Image by Official Star Wars Blog via FlickrThe Vader Project opens this weekend and The Warhol100 works by contemporary international artists utilizing 1:1 scale authentic prop replicas of the Darth Vader helmet used in the Star Wars films.From Vinyl Pulse (a blog about designer toys)The exhibit officially opens this Saturday, February 28th (12-4) with a make-your-own-vader mask event. Come out dressed up as your favorite character.The Vader Project opens at the Warhol this weekend.From I like the Warhol museum for alot of reasons – I am not really sure if Andy Warhol would like the Warhol museum but that is anothr conversation.  If it weren’t for the warhol museum this blog wouldn’t exist.  After a trip to the Warhol on a rainy sunday afternoon – I decided to teach myself to screen print.  The first t-shirt I printed was an IheartPGH t-shirt.  A few year later, I had forgotten about t-shirts and was working on campaigns when we started the IheartPGH blog and brought back the t-shirt idea.  The t-shirts and the blog have been a good thing.  It was an IheartPGH reader that left a comment about Spreadshirt and I was happy to find a great source for IheartPGH T-shirts and now I work for Spreadshirt and when I am not writing about Pittsburgh, I am writing about t-shirts here.  I had no idea when I dragged friend of IheartPGH to the Warhol musuem back in 2003 that it would be so influential.

Here are some links/articles/blog posts that are worth a look:

• Mattress Factory – A Museum of Contemporary Art: ARTIST SPOTLIGHT :: Damien Hirst – I wish I had seen his work when it was at the Mattress Factory – the fly one looks cool and kind of strange at the same time. My favorite art from the Mattress Factor was the dinner party one that was set up there a few years ago. If anyone has a link to that please share.
• Strange Pennyslvania Pittsburgh Premiere! | Dave and Dave’s Excellent Blog – Dave and Dave have a new special about strange things in the great state of PA. I had a chance to chat with the Daves about this new special – I think there are going to be some great segments. Check out the premier on Sept. 25 at 8pm
• WTAE turns 50 « BurghBoy Blogs – Happy 50th Birthday to WTAE!
• find the time to rhyme – David Pohl is an illustrator, an educator, a DJ, a performance artist, an installation artist, a blogger, a gardener and oh, yeah, a drummer! This is his blog.
• Justin Driscoll – The Intersection of Life and Faith – Justin is a youth minister who lives in Western PA who has a background in technology. This is his blog and he has also authored a book "7things I wish I knew before I graduated"

Click here to see more links we like.