My Favorite Art Museum

I saved the best for last - the http://www.slam.org/. My favorite because...I had the good fortune to see my first Monet exhibit there in the 80's in which THREE of his waterlily paintings covered the 3 walls in the same room! Marvelous! Not to mention a roomful of nothing but haystack paintings in another.

You'll notice in the pix the large crane visible on the left - they're in the midst of a major expansion. In front of the museum, is a gorgeous view of a reflecting pool in Forest Park. The long sloping hill is used for sledding in the winter...

Best of all, this museum is free, just like those mentioned in my last two blog posts. Here's a sampling of what you would see from their permanent collections...

Keith, by Chuck Close, 1970

The Mother, Pablo Picasso, 1901

Winter Landscape, Wassily Kandinsky, 1911

The Dreamer, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, 1879

The Promenade with the Railroad Bridge, Argenteuil, Claude Monet, 1874

Stairway at Auvers, Vincent Van Gogh, July 1890

This sculpture by Edgar Degas was stunning.

Little Dancer of Fourteen Years (c. 1880, cast c. 1920)

The description accompanying the work stated: "The model for this sculpture was Marie Van Goethen, a young ballet student at the Paris Opera. When the original wax version (now at the National Gallery in Washington D.C.) was displayed at the 1881 Impressionist exhibition, it was criticized for its unorthodox realism and use of real clothing. It was even considered ugly. The wax Little Dancer was the only sculpture exhibited by Degas in his lifetime. This bronze is one of twenty-four cast after his death."

Just beautiful...

Another Great Art Museum

While in St. Louis, we stopped by an art museum I had only visited once before - the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, located on the campus of Washington University.

It was amazing to see so many great works in such a small place. Picasso's, Cole, Pollack and the list goes on and on...

Here are just a few:

The Fearless Simpleton,Frank Stella, 1984

Sleeping Effort, Jackson Pollack, 1953

Saturday Night, Willem de Kooning, 1956

Aqueduct near Rome, Thomas Cole, 1832

Portrait of Irmgard Steinbart, Edvard Munch, 1913

Portrait of Sylvette, Pablo Picasso, 1954

Best of all - this was another FREE museum!

Free Art Museums

Finally getting the cobwebs dusted off this blog & ready to start posting again! Just got back from my almost annual trip to the Midwest - reconnecting with family and friends.

Some of the week was spent in St. Louis - home of FREE museums! Since I managed to bring all the Excessive Heat Warnings from Phoenix to the Midwest with me, we needed to find indoor activities if at all possible. The first stop was Laumeier Sculpture Park. While the vast majority of work is outdoors, there is a nice little indoor museum/gift shop to cool off in after walking around the acreage...

Greeting you at the entrance is the mosaic, Ricardo Cat 1999 by Niki de Saint Phalle

Not far away is La Libellule, 1996 by by Armand P. Arman

This one was a bit eerie: Eye, 2007 by Tony Tasset

Knots, 1996 by Cosimo Cavallaro

This beautiful shelter is located in the children's sculpture garden. Sorry I don't have the artist's name - doesn't it look like a bug of sorts with all its many wings?

Here are 55 marine buoys tied together - from a distance it looks like a giant caterpillar! Ball? Ball! Wall? Wall!, 1994 by Donald Lipski

The Way, 1972-1980 by Alexander Liberman

Ahh...that air-conditioned museum was a welcome site as we returned from our hour long, sweltering hike around the grounds.

Please visit their website for a complete listing of the more than 70 sculptures on display and pick a day when the weather is compatible for at least 2 leisurely hours of walking...