Far be it from me to pass judgment on floral arrangements. This one was awarded first prize at Art In Bloom. I like the fact that its gallery has windows overlooking the museum’s central great hall. The painting the arrangement refers to is on the opposite wall, https://www.slam.org/collection/objects/1449/ .
It’s become a local tradition. In late winter, our art museum puts on an event called Art In Bloom. Expert floral arrangers are invited to create a design inspired by one of the pieces from the collection. This year there were thirty-some entries. It can be horrifically crowded, but the museum opens to members two hours early on the first morning. It’s the only time worth going.
It's the time of year when the Saint Louis Art Museum draws its biggest crowds. For three days in late winter, the most talented floral arrangers in the region are invited to construct a piece that reflects the feeling of something in the museum's collection, if much more perishable.
I've been shooting it for years, and it's a challenge. The Friday to Sunday run can be just packed. The museum sets up remote parking a ten minute drive away. Early Friday morning is reserved for members (we are) but it is still hard to get a clear shot. I stood for a few minutes before one arrangement, camera held high, waiting impatiently for the spectators to clear. Someone beside me asked, "Would you like me to ask that lady to move to the side?" I told her that the person was my wife and, if necessary, I would use telepathy.
Pretty, but heat resistant plants.Finally something interesting to shoot here today. Hope the storms hold off.
We had thunderstorms on and off all day Saturday so we didn't attempt the Chinese cultural festival at the botanical garden. Today should be glorious and we will give it another try. For now, another earlier shot from the garden, a bush packed with rhododendron blossoms. Ironic that something so beautiful is poisonous.
Our Missouri Botanical Garden must have thousands of species of plants. Being a child of the concrete jungle, I usually have no idea what's what. We use a phone app called PlantSnap, which can identify most of them from taking a photo and comparing it to an image database. This is the bud of a Greek peony, which the app says is endangered. It's well cared for here.
We have the return of a big annual event at the garden this weekend, the Chinese cultural festival. It's a photo feast but the forecast is for on and off thunderstorms all day. If we can go, you will see it here.
Staying with our spring walk through the botanical garden for now. Weather can get in the way of cruising with a camera in the Midwest at this time of year. We had some severe thunderstorms last evening and a couple of small tornadoes in the area. Then there can be fine days when you can find an image like this.
I thought I was running out of material but I forgot that Mrs. C and I recently did a long springtime walk through our wonderful botanical garden. Lots of opportunities to get in close.
Another wildflower from Forest Park in infrared. It's what I got, but you can create dramatic effects with a little work in Photoshop.
When I'm totally out of material and don't have an idea in my head there are a couple of go-to places I can count on. One of them is the large and complex Missouri Botanical Garden, often seen in these posts. Saturday was damp and unseasonably cool, bringing out saturated colors. I'm not usually a flower guy but I'm always ready to take the easy way out. No idea what this is and even my PlantSnap app couldn't identify it. Suggestions welcome.
There is a good size Saturday market in Tamarindo, known in the Hispanic world as a feria. You can find local fruits and vegetables. A couple from Buenos Aires were selling Argentine empanadas (we got some for lunch - yum). Surprisingly, someone was selling Polish sausage and pierogies. There was local ice cream, honey, crafts, art and jewelry. This young man was selling potted flowers, delightful if you had a home to bring them to. Since we are staying in a rented condo we could not patronize him.
I have other photos to show from Ste. Genevieve but this is worth an interruption. It snowed here most of Tuesday afternoon. Our average latest frost is about two weeks ago. Being in the middle of things we get buffeted by air masses moving east from the Rockies, south from the Canadian plains and north from the Gulf of Mexico. This shot was taken from my front porch yesterday. I wonder what the tulips and dogwood will look like by today.
Dogwood tree blooming in the sun and tombstones in the shadows at the town cemetery in Ste. Genevieve.
I make no claim to being a nature or floral photographer. My attention runs more toward the urban and ironic. Still, whatever these are in the botanical garden got my attention and a daily photo blog has a hungry mouth to feed. Somehow they don't look real, in the sense that the colors came from the earth rather than Photoshop. But what I saw is what you get.
What may we see in our gardens as genetic editing technology progresses even further? It's worth reading up some on CRISPR-Cas9 techniques if it's new to you. O brave new world
That has such people in't! Shakespeare, The
Tempest Act 5, scene 1.
Spring in the botanical garden. I have no idea what this is. Being a kid from the concrete jungle my knowledge of gardening is vanishingly small. This flower looks inside out or upside down, maybe to make it easier for bees to get to the business end of it.
Inside the Climatron. The interior landscaping and airflow somehow divide it into four wet - dry - cool - warm zones, each with its own characteristic plants. I have no idea what the red flowers are. They were some distance away and it was hard to focus just on them and not the surrounding leaves. (I should have put the focus on single point but I didn't think of it.) The flowers look to me like they are rising in jubilation.
