PHCC faculty, staff shine at summer art show

Faculty and the staff in the arts at colleges and universities are behind-the-scenes nurturers and mentors for aspiring artists, sublimating their own aesthetic impulses in service to those of their students. So it's great that most institutions feature the work of the workers at least once a year. Right now, check out "The Staff and Faculty Summer Art Show" at Pasco-Hernando Community College. It continues through July 26 at the Rao Musunuru, M.D. Art Gallery in the Alric Pottberg Library on the West Campus, 10230 Ridge Road, New Port Richey. Shown is Hummingbird at Bosque de Paz, a photograph by Arla Altman. Hours are 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Thursday. Free. (727) 816-3231. ...

Rare circus photos come to Tampa Bay History Center

A marvelous show of circus photographs that debuted at the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art in Sarasota is coming to Tampa. So if you missed it in 2010, see it now. Or see it again at the Tampa Bay History Center beginning Saturday.

Frederick W. Glasier (1866-1950) created a remarkable body of work during the early 20th century when traveling circuses were in their heyday. His photographs were almost lost to history after the surviving glass plate negatives suffered years of neglect, even after the Ringling acquired 1,700 of them from a collector in 1963. ...

Review: Prints at Leepa-Rattner a glimpse into Picasso's world

TARPON SPRINGS

Few of his peers can stand up to a comparison to Pablo Picasso. He competes only with Henri Matisse as the greatest artist of the 20th century. So we shouldn't take in the large collection of prints by Francoise Gilot with an eye to comparisons between them and a smaller group of Picasso prints, both on view at the Leepa-Rattner Museum of Art.

Gilot, as many readers will know, was Picasso's mistress from 1943 to 1953, and the couple had two children, Claude and Paloma (who gained fame as a designer for Tiffany). Gilot was an artist with her first significant exhibition when they met. She was in her early 20s and he was 61. After a decade with the artist, she did the unthinkable: She left him. He was astonished and belittled her, saying (according to a quote from her), "You imagine people will be interested in you. They won't ever, really, just for yourself. It will only be a kind of curiosity they will have about a person whose life has touched mine so intimately."...

Find Pride and Passion at Tampa Museum of Art

Museum news: The fun and now famous Pride and Passion is at the Tampa Museum of Art on Saturday. It's a great party that's part of the annual Pride festivities and it benefits the museum. Yes, the $85 ticket is pricey but it includes a $50 membership along with great food, drink and entertainment. It usually sells out but if you go to tampamuseum.org and place an order right now, you might score one. Across the bay in St. Petersburg, the Museum of Arts, St. Petersburg has lowered summer admission from $17 for adults to $10 (fine-arts.org)....

Two new exhibits open at Morean Arts Center

BY LENNIE BENNETT

Times Art Critic

ST. PETERSBURG

Denis Gaston and Kurt Piazza are the unlikeliest of wall fellows. Yet together they are for two new exhibitions that flow into each other at the Morean Arts Center. But both are so compelling, I don't care if there are no common threads in their art, and I won't diminish either's work by stretching to find them.

Gaston has exhibited in the area for decades, and his figurative paintings and drawings are instantly recognizable. Yet for all the years I have looked at his strange humans, transformed into masklike and fetishistic images, I never tire of their wondrous and provocative variety. ...

Florida Museum of Photographic Arts in Tampa names new director

After more than a year without a director, the Florida Museum of Photographic Arts in Tampa has one: Jane Simon, formerly the curator at University of South Florida Contemporary Arts Museum. Simon will assume management and curatorial duties in her new job.

"My first priorities are to beef up our exhibition schedule for 2014 and 2015," she said, "and apply for national grants."

Simon received a bachelor of arts degree in art history from Bryn Mawr College and a master's degree from Williams College. Before USF, she was the curator of exhibitions for the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art in Madison, Wis....

Little sandwiches, special sweets for a Mother's Day tea party

Official days of recognition have always seemed artificial to me, over-hyped opportunities for the retail industry to part us from our money. Why should my children feel they must send expensive gifts to me on Mother's Day, for example, when they express their love for me most meaningfully in their frequent phone calls and genuine interest in my daily life?

Well, because they do, just as I did when my mother was alive. Just as you probably do, too. ...

Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg, goes shopping for poppy art

ST. PETERSBURG

And the winner is ... Poppies!

The Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg can boast 10 new works in its permanent collection depicting the colorful flower, the bounty of an annual April event that lets museum members have the final say in what new art the museum purchases.

In past years, only three works have been up for a vote by members of the Collectors' Circle support group, which hosts the Collectors' Choice Dinner. The winner is purchased with funds raised by the group during the year....

New group show opens at Clayton Gallery

A new group show opens today at Clayton Galleries, 4105 S MacDill Ave., Tampa, and continues through June 1. Shown is Bruce Marsh's Pasture with Pipes. Hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. claytongalleries.net. or (813) 831-3753.

Doll exhibit at Florida Craftsmen Gallery toys with whimsy

BY LENNIE BENNETT

Times Art Critic

ST. PETERSBURG

Dolls are probably the oldest toys in the world and also have a long history as ritualistic objects. Beginning in the 20th century, they became fine craft collectibles.

"All Doll'd Up!" at Florida Craftsmen Gallery has dolls that can be put into all three categories. None has been created as a toy but there is plenty of whimsy to suggest playfulness. There is in some a Tim Burton sensibility that suggests the dark side of imagination. ...

Paintings on loan bring more to St. Petersburg's Dalí Museum

ST. PETERSBURG

If you haven't revisited the Dalí Museum in a while, the next few months are a good time to do so. Through September, a heroically sized and conceived painting is on loan from the Beaverbrook Art Gallery in Canada.

Santiago El Grande is indeed grand, measuring about 10 by 13 feet. In it Saint James, the patron saint of Spain, emerges from the sea riding a white horse and brandishing a large crucifix instead of a sword. Behind him, a Gothic architectural construction bursts with flashes of light and misty figures. In the foreground is the artist's wife and muse Gala as witness, staring pensively from a dense, shroud-like garment....

Hidden gem of an exhibit at Baisden Gallery

Even in his frenetic years as a top fashion designer running up frocks for pals such as Elizabeth Taylor, Michael Vollbracht remained an artist. He's retired from fashion (for now) and spends more time creating his paintings and collages. See them at Baisden Gallery, 442 Grand Central Ave., Tampa, through June 22 (and near Mise en Place and the Oxford Exchange so plan a visit around lunch). Ten percent of sales will be donated to St. Joseph's Children's Hospital Foundation. Hours are noon to 3 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. Free. (813) 250 1511....

New exhibit opens at Bleu Acier in Tampa

Erika Greenberg-Schneider does not often organize public art exhibitions at Bleu Acier. Much of her time is spent collaborating with artists, including her husband, sculptor Dominique Labauvie, on prints in her atelier. The master printer works with painters, photographers and sculptors throughout the world to create museum-quality print editions.

So "Steve McClure: Mentiri" is cause for celebration and a visit to the gallery at 109 W Columbus Drive in Tampa to see recent works on paper that have been on view before. ...

Impressive American art show closing at Tampa Museum of Art

Last days to see American art exhibit at Tampa Museum of Art

The last day for one of the best art shows of the season is Sunday, so visit or revisit "To See as Artists See: American Art from the Phillips Collection" at the Tampa Museum of Art, 120 Gasparilla Plaza, before it closes.

The 107 paintings are a survey of American art from the 1850s through the 1960s by some of the most important names in the genre, among them Winslow Homer, Thomas Eakins, Childe Hassam, Georgia O'Keeffe, Edward Hopper, Grandma Moses, Jacob Lawrence, Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko....

Museum of Fine Arts conservatory named for donor

ST. PETERSBURG — In most museums, many rooms bear names of patrons and that tradition is honored throughout the Museum of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg. But one of its most distinctive areas remained nameless.

That has changed with the announcement that the museum's dramatic glass atrium will become the Mary Alice McClendon Conservatory in recognition of her role as one of the most generous benefactors in its history. In addition to gifts of art works, Mrs. McClendon, 75, and her late husband Doyle, gave the largest one-time gift in the museum's history, $9 million for the capital campaign in 2006....