Beyond Brick and Ivy in Boston

This is such a beautiful buttoned-up town.  Surrounding the red brick covered in ivy and way too many college logo sweaters, there is an under current of exploration and exuberance!

I mainly explored the southern neighborhoods, as that is where my art trail lead me. 

I should mention that one of the absolute best art museums in the city is the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, it is a fabulous cultivated mansion. Everywhere you turn is more ascetic vignettes and visual stimuli. This woman curated a vast range of art, so effortlessly, you are transported to a timeless world of treasures.  Her collection of Japaneses screens stands out in my mind as dose the nicknamed "Leather and Lace" room with embossed leather wall paper and her collection of antique lace on display, but the courtyard alone will take your breath way! Alas you can not take any pictures there so you simple must go in person!!

These are my finds:

first stop                           Harvard Museum of Natural History

The flowers, the Jelly-fish, and sea slugs are hand blown glass by father and son Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka, I know it is hard to believe, the skill and the scientific accuracy are beyond amazing!

Second                    Museum of Fine Art, Boston (trust me call it MFA)

The stand out Artists where:

Shinque Smith a female artist using feminine street art gestures in mixed media painting that are laden with fabric and connected to fashion, glamor and fantasy.

&

Jamie Wyeth a master painter that pushes water color to a its limits, with effortless gestures, using classic landscape motifs of the "Brandy wine" tradition in a pop culture context. The stunning portraits of Andy Warhol left me scratching me head at the juxtaposition (in a good way)!

around Boston:                       The Library and more

I really got to now the artist John Singer Sargent as so much more than a masterful portrait artist his mural at the library are vast and wonderful. (I also loved his array of works at the Gardener Museum raging from sketchy studies to jaw dropping Flamenco dancers!)

Bonus:                               ICA at the Institute for Contemporary Art