Arnold Schwarzenegger museum opens in Austria
Former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (3rdR) and and Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann (R) attend on October 7, 2011 the unveiling of a statue during the opening of Arnold Schwarzenegger museum at a house where he spent his childhoood in Thal, some 220 kilometers, south of Vienna.
Arnold Schwarzenegger inaugurated a museum devoted to Arnold Schwarzenegger — complete with a hulking bronze statue of himself striking a "heroic" bodybuilder's pose — in his Austrian hometown on Friday.
Schwarzenegger's childhood home in Thal, Austria, has been converted into a museum, Deutsche Presse-Agentur reports.
The museum tells the story of Schwarzenegger's life and career, from a boy born in 1947 in a small Austrian town to champion bodybuilder, Hollywood star and then U.S. politician, DPA says.
The 64-year-old former governor of California, accompanied by his 18-year-old son Patrick, inaugurated the museum and unveiled the larger-than-life bronze statue of himself.
"It is my great wish that everyone who visits this museum understands one thing: That everyone can be successful in his own way," said the "Terminator" star, according to DPA.
The New York Daily News recently reported that Schwarzenegger has personally commissioned as many as seven "heroic" statues of himself, including the one at the museum in Austria.
The 8-foot, 580-pound bronze sculptures depict Schwarzenegger during his bodybuilding days, "flexing in a classic body-builder pose that flaunts his football-sized biceps, chiseled abs and granite quads," the New York Daily News says.
Schwarzenegger, while in his hometown of Thal, did not comment on recent rumors that he might enter Austrian politics, DPA says.