Museum of Fine Arts
St. Petersburg, Florida

Museums are such important parts of our communities and when one does something well it is worth celebrating.  The St. Petersburg Museum of Fine Arts has done something right for a long time.  It started out as a small museum with a few classical collections then added unique signature pieces that enhanced the collection...a wonderful Turner over looking London's harbor in a blue mist. There some other fine impressionist pieces, a pre-columbian collection and a very nice glass collection.  I have special affection for this little gem of a museum that over looks the bay.  For years our art teacher meetings and special events were held there.  I have taken hundreds of students to many special exhibitions through the years like the Chihuly exhibit that took over the whole museum.  The museum then added on a new magnificent wing bridge with a high glass ceiling and natural lighted room.  The new gifts shop is much larger and carries wonderful art books for adults and children.  This has been an unpretentious museum that has steered calmly though hard economic times and has grown almost surprisingly into an ever increasing polished diamond of art.    

Duncan McClellen's glass work

new larger gift shop

Bridged room with excellent cafe

Current Ancient Egyptian Exhibition 

Museums house our history and our creations. They make available to the public what could never be seen otherwise.  If a private person were to buy the Mona Lisa then it would never have been seen by the thousands that go to the Louvre weekly to gaze upon Leonardo's masterpiece.  It would have been gone from our sight forever.  Museums are wonderful places that allow us to walk with greatness and commune with the most creative people in our civilizations history.  They are like time capsules that take us places we could not otherwise go.  Of course I love the Louvre, the D'Orsay, Moma, The Metropolitan, the Getty and so many more....but there are small gems of museums all over the world that we must support and treasure that we have them...and that they accessible to us, and to our children who will become the creators, the artists, and the patrons of the future.  Support your local museums, go often, walk among greatness, gaze into the creations of genius and talent....you soul will be glad you did! I have never walked out of a museum that I did not feel better than when I walked in, except the day one of my students bumped into a set of Dale Chihuly clustered bowls.....they rocked back and forth, I counted in my mind how much it would cost it they broke...80'000, 100,000...I wasn't sure...the bowls continued to rock, until slowly they stopped...no one had dared to touch them...no they did not break, but I  almost had a heart attack that day!  

Knitted coral reef 

student room with work from studying ancient Egyptian styles

Student learning area

student art room