Travel: 48 Hours: Global Agenda

Montreal

IF YOU'RE the kind of traveller who spends as much time exploring the social context of your destination as its brochure-puffed hot spots, you should enjoy "Photography and Transformations of the Contemporary City: Venezia - Marghera". Conceived in 1917 by the Venetian Count Guiseppe Volpi as an expansion of Venice, Marghera, which overlooks the island from the mainland, became a model of rampant industrialisation before succumbing to urban pollution, as the shipyards, petrochemical plants and heavy industries loomed over its residential area. The show's 230 photographs by 15 contemporary photographers capture the area's complex history, reflecting concerns about the management of post-industrial society that are pertinent to cities everywhere.

Canadian Centre for Architecture, 1920 rue Baile, , Quebec, Canada (00 1 514 939 7000) to 25 Apr, $3-$6

Madrid

IN A show curated by the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, 230 of Man Ray's most important photographs will be on display at Madrid's Rena Sofa museum until the end of April. Although much of the American's fame stems from his portraits of famous contemporaries such as Picasso, Bunuel, Hemingway and his partner Lee Miller, Man Ray stretched his artistic muscles with his surrealistic prints, many of them using the process he called Solarisation.

Centro de Arte Rena Sofa, 52 Santa Isabel, Madrid, Spain (00 34 91 467 5062) to 23 Apr, closed Tuesday, Pts500

Barbados

THE FORMAL gardens and parkland belonging to the 17th-century Holders House on Barbados is the location for a leading Caribbean cultural event, Holders Season. Founded in 1993, the celebration of opera, music and theatre attracts world-famous artists such as Luciano Pavarotti and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in 1997, who no doubt find the charms of the location hard to resist. Highlights this year include Kit Hesketh Harvey's Caribbean adaptation of The Tempest, starring Kylie Minogue, performances of Kit and the Widow by artists from London's West End and a grand finale featuring the Barbados Youth Orchestra with the Jamaican-born, internationally acclaimed bass, Willard White.

Holders House, Barbados (00 1 246 432 6385) to 20 Mar

Throughout Europe

A LAUDABLE cultural incentive - or a canny ploy to take our minds off delays at some of Europe's busier airports? The Airports Council International (ACI) has just released its cultural events calendar for 1999 and it states that not only "painting, sculpture and photographic exhibitions" but also "music performances and stage productions are becoming more and more common at airports". Items for the lounge-weary tourist's delectation this year include "150 years of Belgian Mail" at Brussels, "Hafenkonzert: Hamburg Harbour Proms" at Hamburg, and a philatelic exhibition in Menorca...