Dale Chihuly in St. Petersburg, FL

When I was trying to find a restaurant the night before I left Florida, I stumbled across the Chihuly Collection presented by Morean Arts Center in St. Petersburg. The museum was already closed. I decided to return the next morning when it opened, before I had to catch my plane.

Image from www.chihuly.com

I got to the museum early and still had to wait in line when it opened. There were at least 10 people ahead of me waiting to buy tickets. As I have mentioned in an earlier post, I did a minor in glass blowing when I was at Parsons. I have a deep respect for glass blowers, as it is a craft that takes years to develop. In the two years that I studied glass, I only scratched the surface.

Image  from www.chihuly.com

Within the glass world, Dale Chihuly is an artist that glass blowers love to hate. It could be his boisterous attitude, fame, or the fact that he has a legion of blowers who produce his work, that have created this stigma. However, when you get beyond the man, the work is beautiful - breathtakingly beautiful.

Image from www.chihuly.com

The museum is small and really well done. They don't allow photography, so I couldn't take any photos. The finishes used in the interior are rough wood, blued steel, and lustrous plaster walls, which create a fantastic backdrop to Chihuly's installations. I pulled the three photos above from Dale Chihuly's site. The images are close to the installations shown in the museum.
The pieces are magnificent in life. The scale of the work is large and it makes the pieces dynamic. The colors are vibrant and he sometimes plays with texture. As I was following people through the museum, I could hear them gasp with joy as they rounded a corner and came across a new piece. It was fun! You feel like you are traveling through someone's dream, as you move through the museum, because the pieces are so surreal. I was able to make it through the museum and still make my flight with a little hussle. It was a great way to end my trip.
I highly recommend going to this museum if you find yourself in St. Petersburg, FL. If you can't make it to Florida, opening this week in Boston MA, at the Museum of Fine Arts, is Chihuly - Through the Looking Glass. April 10th through August 7th 2011.

Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, FL

Un Chien Andalou (1928)

In preparation for my trip to Florida, since I knew that I would be going to the Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, I downloaded Un Chein Andalou on NetFlix. I thought it would get me the mood for going to the museum. This movie, by Salvador Dali and Luis Bunuel, was thought to be shocking when it premiered in 1928. Seventy plus years later, and it still has an air of shock, humor, and the absurd.

I have been reading for several months about the opening of the new museum designed by HOK. It opened on January 11, 2011 at 11:11am.

Since a business trip had me in the area, I drove there after going to see the BOK Tower Gardens. The building is striking in person. I walked around it and there are interesting views from every angle. They also did a good job of landscaping the grounds around the public space.

Costing a mere 28.5 million dollars (ha!), it took three years to construct. The juxtaposition between the concrete and glass makes sense in relation to Salvador Dali's work.

Image via Google Images

He often had these balances between hard lines and soft or melting images. I think he would have approved of the absurd placement of the bulbous glass forms.

This is the only photo I got from inside the museum. One of the guards hunted me down and told me no photos are allowed to be taken inside. While I really like the exterior of the building, I am disappointed with the interior. The stats list that the interior is 68,000 sq ft. It is hard to imagine that is the actual size. When you first walk in, you enter through the gift shop. It seems inappropriate. You think you are there to see art, but you immediately feel like the museum has nothing to do with art and only with pushing merchandise. Then, you have to battle your way through the store to get to the counter to buy your ticket, which costs $25.00! I know they have to pay for the museum somehow, but it felt over priced; especially when I discovered that the galleries were only on the top floor and maybe covered 20,000 sq ft.

I was happy to see such a concentrated amount of Salvador Dali's work together. I have always been on the fence with his work. Sometimes I love it. Sometimes I hate it. What I did love about one of the galleries is that they showed his early work when he was a teenager. You got to see him trying out different genres and practicing his technique. It was tight connect to the large masterpieces he did later in life.

There is a living wall installation on the way into and exiting the gift shop. I mean museum...

Overall, the building by HOK does stand up to the positive press it has received. How the museum is set up and run stands entirely aside from the structure, but does impact a visitor's experience with the building.