Chihuly Orbs

These are colorful, vibrant orbs from Chihuly's "Float Boat" art installation at the Desert Botanical Gardens.  If you can believe it, the Garden did not have anything printed with the names of each art installation except for small plaques placed before each exhibit so after taking photos of the glass art for two days and one night, I had to go back and walk the entire Garden to write down the name of each art installation.  (Such a chore in our gorgeous Arizona weather as the temperature was about 70. )  The Garden is supposed to have a book published with the current Chihuly art installation called "Chihuly: Nature of Glass" in a year or two.  So, enjoy the magnificent glass art pieces in person while you can.  The art exhibition ends on May 31.  This is worth coming to Arizona to see.  

Detail of Chihuly Glass

The delicate and colorful end of a piece of Chihuly art is vibrantly silhouetted against the blue sky.   This tip of a Chihuly glass sculpture is from "The Sun," currently installed at the Desert Botanical Gardens. 

Tip of Chihuly Desert Chandelier

This the tip of the "Orange Hornet and Eel Grass Chandelier" by Chihuly, currently on display at the Desert Botanical Gardens through May 31, 2009. Do you think this glass chandelier is called a hornet because the orange glass pieces look like the back end of a hornet?

The below photo shows the entire chandelier and how it was displayed in the garden in the daytime. It was hung from a metal shade structure that is used to protect more delicate cacti. I liked the nighttime perspective best. There are many works of art to enjoy either day or night.

World's Best Collector Car Auctions

Every year the wealthy come to Scottsdale for the world's largest collector car auctions. This year Scottsdale had Barrett-Jackson Auction Co. and Gooding and Co.'s Collector Auction making a splash with collector car sales, along with RM Auctions and Russo & Steele Auctions.  

Barrett Jackson had $63 million  in sales and this is only a three day event!  Gooding and Co sold $32.4 million and had the highest single car sales.  They sold a 1960 Ferrari GT California Spider for $4.95 million and a 1937 Talbot-Lago Tear Drop Coupe for $3.5 million.   RM Auctions sold $18.2 million in collector cars, and Russo & Steele sold $17.1 million.   We see all types of collector cars on the streets of Scottsdale during this big event.  I took this photo of the back of a 1930s wood-paneled Packard parked in Old Town Scottsdale (say that three times fast).

Vibrant Fuscia Cactus Flower

Speaking of spectacular cactus flowers, here is one I took last weekend at the Desert Botanical Gardens.  I took it using my super macro, which really gives a different perspective to plants and flower stamens. Cacti live in such hot and dry desert environments that it is surprising when a tough-looking cactus produces such a beautiful, vibrant bloom.  

People who move to Arizona start buying and planting cactuses around their house or in pots on their patios.  They often kill them though because they water them too much.  Or, they think the cactus never needs water and they fail to water them in the heat of the summer months, when it is amazing that any plant survives the 110 degree heat. Generally, cacti need watering about once every two weeks in the summer but the more established the cactus is, the less hand-watering is necessary. Monsoons provide much-needed nutrients and water to cactus.   I tend to err on the side of overwatering my cactus, but I do try to mimic actual rain by gently sprinkling a few drops on the cactus starting at the top of the cactus, not at the base of the cactus. The structure of the cactus is generally designed to catch raindrops as cactus have very shallow roots. 

Happy Chinese New Year!

Today is the day to celebrate the Chinese New Year. This is the Year of the Ox, as shown on the photo of this New Year's card. One of our friends at work, shown in the photo below, hosted a Chinese New Year's celebration at her home on Saturday night. The food was superb. For drinks we had Asian Sparklers of pear, lychee and pomegranate. For food we had veggie spring rolls, szechuan shrimp, dim sum with crab and pork, vegetable chow mien, chicken lettuce wraps, barbecue pork, meatballs with coconut sauce, mango pudding and, of course, fortune cookies (even though fortune cookies were created in California between 1914 to 1918).

This is an important traditional celebration and it is actually called Lunar New Year. Those of us in the West tend to call it Chinese New Year. It is a time where people visit friends and family. The color red is used in decorations, including Chinese lanterns. New clothes are purchased and worn. Red packets or envelopes of money are given to kids and newly married couples, singles and the elderly.

What is the origin of Lunar New Year?  One tale is that the celebration started with a mythical beast called "Nian" or "Year." Nian apparently came to villages on the first day of the New Year and ate livestock, crops, and people, including kids.  If villagers put food at their front door on New Year's Day, supposedly Nian would eat the food and leave the villagers alone.  As the story goes, one time a child was wearing red and Nian got scared and ran away.  Thus, villagers put out red Chinese lanterns and other decorations to keep Nian away.  Villagers also used firecrackers to scare away the monster.

Chihuly and Agave

The juxtaposition of Chihuly glass art and an agave cactus at the Desert Botanical Gardens is very pleasing to the eye.  As you explore different angles of Chihuly glass and nature at the Garden, you can see how the artist creatively blended his glassworks with cactus.  

I grew up in the Arizona desert and love cactus over any other types of plants.  Each is very unique and tends to have amazing flowers that live for a very short time.  On some cacti, you have to be very quick to see the flower as they can open, bloom, and die in just a few hours.  Some only bloom at night so you have to go out and look at the flower only in the moonlight.  Agaves, like the one in the bottom right of the photo, are one of my favorites and I have over 22 agaves in my yard.  I have grown many of them up from pups.  The large blue agaves are truly striking.  In the days to come I will post photos of some of them. 

Chihuly after Dark

The Desert Botanical Gardens is one of my favorite places to go.   I love the cactus, serenity, and beauty of this special place and it has wonderful music and art events.  Currently, Dale Chihuly has created exquisite works of glass that are interwoven with the cactus throughout the Desert Botanical Gardens.   Viewing the works of glass art after dark is truly magical.  You will see many photos over time of the various pieces of Chihuly artwork and the vibrant cactus that exists here in Arizona.  The installation is called Chihuly: The Nature of Glass and it runs from November 22, 2008 through May 31, 2009.  The Desert Botanical Gardens are only accepting timed reservations click here.  

Yesterday, Sharon of Phoenix Daily Photo posted a photo of this same glass artwork in the daytime.

Light as Art

We had the world debut of a "large-scale, high-voltage art spectacle light transmission" by artist D.A. Therrien last weekend.  It was quite avant garde and over 2,000 people turned out to see it.  

For two nights only, the "BEAUTIFUL LIGHT" illuminated Scottsdale's downtown canal waterfront at Southbridge.  It was a 500 kilowatt, 80 foot wide, "4 Letter word machine," which was the first installation in the BEAUTIFUL LIGHT series.   As you can see from the photos, there were four men dressed in white who controlled the panels 80 feet above them.  The bottom photo shows the crane and the reflection in the water of the lights from above. 

The series explores the purity of white light, the mystery of language, the precision of digital codes, and the magic of 4 letters - A, C, G, T - representing the DNA code, and consequently, all known life.  

For a link to a website that includes a youtube demonstration of the installation, operation and performance of the BEAUTIFUL LIGHT artwork, click here.

"Such a complex and large-scale artwork is unprecedented in the State of Arizona," said Margaret Bruning, Associate Director of Scottsdale Public Art. 

Scottsdale City Hall and Statistics

Today's photo is of Scottsdale's City Hall.  It was designed by architect Bennie Gonzales in 1968, and it has an interior kiva for meetings.  

Some of you may be thinking water and ducks do not belong in the desert.  It is true, and we do have water because of our ingenious ancestors, the Hohokam, who inhabited the Scottsdale area from about 300 BC to 1400 AD.   The Hohokam were farmers and built a vast and complex array of over 125 miles of irrigation canals.  These canals are still in use today by Salt River Project.  The canals provide water to farms, homes, golf courses, businesses, and carry the Central Arizona Project (CAP) water from the Colorado River, 200 miles away.

  

Scottsdale is home to about 250,000 people, the sixth largest city in Arizona and is about 185 square miles in size.  Arizona became a state in 1912, and Scottsdale became a City in 1951. Scottsdale was named the "Most Livable City" in the United States in 1993 by the United States Conference of Mayors.  Temperatures typically range from 40 degrees to 70 degrees in winter and 75 degrees to 104 degrees in summer, and yes, it truly is a dry heat.  We receive very little humidity.  

Scottsdale is a premier golf and resort destination and I will share many hotels, golf course and dining experiences with you in the days to come.  One quote that describes Scottsdale was by the New York Times when it proclaimed Scottsdale as "a desert version of Miami's South Beach."

Arabian Horse Statue and Fountain

This fountain and bronze statue of five horses is in a traffic circle in the middle of Fifth Avenue and Marshall Way, which is in the heart of the shopping district of Old Town Scottsdale.  The statue is by Bob Parks who owned an art gallery on Fifth Avenue for more than 30 years. He created this bronze fountain 19 years ago.  He worked with Tom Chauncey, a famous Arabian horse-breeder, and Parks chose five celebrated Arabian horses as models for this statue.  The names of the horses are Ben Bask, Mi Toska, MS Batista, Frye Love, and Euros.  The statues are anatomically correct for Arabian horses, including distinctive muscle structure, arched necks, high tails, and large eyes. Parks created more than 300 bronze sculptures and his customers included the Saudi Royal Family.

Legendary Civic Leader: Herb Drinkwater

Every city has legendary civic leaders. Scottsdale's is Herb Drinkwater, a long-time Mayor and businessman. He was known for his practical jokes and for being an exuberant city booster.  He passed away from cancer in 1997 after serving as a member or Mayor of the Scottsdale City Council for 26 years.  When he retired he had a 96% approval rating.  Mayor Drinkwater has been immortalized in this bronze statute that is displayed at the Scottsdale Mall.

An example of his enthusiasm for Scottsdale is that when Arie Luyendyk, a native of Holland, won the Indianapolis 500 in 1990, someone told Mayor Drinkwater that Luyendyk lived in Scottsdale, and Drinkwater replied that he will send him a letter of congratulations for living in Scottsdale.

Old Scottsdale Meets New

For my first post, I am showing a popular piece of public art displayed in the Scottsdale Mall, which is right next to the Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts. The LOVE sculpture was created by artist Robert Indiana. It is 12 feet high and 12 feet wide and 6 feet deep. It is made of aluminum and weighs 3,800 pounds. The work was featured on 330 million United States postage stamps issued in the 1970s. The art of Robert Indiana has been exhibited at the Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C., and other leading museums and galleries. Scottsdale purchased the LOVE statue in 2002.

The Scottsdale Mall is not a shopping mall, but is a public plaza with fountains, gardens, grassy areas, restaurants, City Hall, City public library, and museums. The public plaza is adjacent to Old Town Scottsdale, where the Old West meets the New. Old Town is a very popular shopping and tourist district, with numerous galleries, cafes, outdoor musicians, public art, and with many Western and Native American features.