Vindauga

Dale Chihuly currently has an exhibit at Fairchild Tropical Gardens. I went to see the show with my family over the holidays.

I saw an exhibit of Chihuly glass earlier in the year (or maybe last year) in St Pete. That show was mostly inside a museum with very few pieces outside. Those pieces were really neat. I was really looking forward to seeing his work in an organic setting like Fairchild. The first piece you see when you come in is this tall…thing.

I had seen something similar at the St. Pete show, but that was not nearly so vibrant as this piece and I found this one much more striking. The red and yellow glass really stands out, especially on a clear day like the one in which this picture was taken. There is also something fascinating about the fragility of it; I can’t help but think what a single rock would do to this graceful structure. But to be honest, I don’t really care about this piece. The next piece that we came across in our loop around the gardens was more my cup of tea.

Near the exhibit of desert plants there is a small pond, which is usually just a nice place to take a rest on a tour through the park (before they build the new entrance, this was pretty far away from the main body of the park). The addition of these glass bubbles floating on the water, while not subtle, doesn’t really change the space but it does enhance it. This is the kind of thing that I think would look really nice in your yard. The first one would just freak you out any time any one mowed the lawn. But standing looking at this piece I could already see the next piece, and it looked cool.

These harsh, needle-like sticks were poking up from in and around that cacti; neat. Fairchild is doing a thing, one Thursdays I think, where they let you into the park at night. They usually only do special night tours but for the Chihuly exhibit they have the pieces lit and you need to see them at night for that. Obviously, I wasn’t there at night. I might try to make it back to see the night stuff but I’ve heard that it looks better in the day. I think most of the lighting was after the fact, not designed as such. I think that these, if lit from inside, maybe not too strong a light, would be great at night. I don’t think they are lit from inside though. I don’t have images of everything, and I’m not posting all the images I have, but I love this next one.

Call it luck with lighting. The sun was coming in through the trees just right to make that one bulb glow. This is one of a series of pieces hidden back along one of the side trails, a trail that you can’t see if you take the tram through the park. I think all of the pieces along this trail are great. If you aren’t careful, you might walk right by some of these, they fit in so well with the environment. One of the pieces back in this section is made of neon tubes though, I imagine that at night it looks great.

The boat is definitely something I had seen before. This was inside the museum in St Pete, it was surrounded by lots and lots of other pieces of glass. I thought this was really weird in St Pete. I mean, an old, well-worn row boat filled with glass sitting on the floor. What is that supposed to mean? Here, under a tree sitting in a lake, though probably just as strange, seems much more appropriate. But I thought the real hit of the show were these.

Scattered across one of the lakes at Fairchild were these glass ornaments. I love these things and have way too many pictures of them. The change in the water that accompanies your change in perspective is worth walking all the way around the lake.

We didn’t get to see the whole show, there were some pieces in the orchid house that we didn’t have time to check out. And the crowds were making me crazy; it was boxing day after all. But I really enjoyed this show and if you have the opportunity I highly recommend it.