Thursday, March 5, 2009

Garden of Delights

Our first destination in Atlanta was the Botanical Gardens. B and I had been once before but it was the first time for all of our “kids.” We had hoped they would be as impressed as we had been and, from their enthusiasm, we think they were.

There were two special exhibits going on. One was of glass art by several different artists. These large pieces ( about 3’ tall) were tucked into some foliage in one of the spacious green houses.

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This piece is currently adorning the top of a large fountain in the main courtyard. (Note the skyline in the background.)

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This blown glass piece is a Dale Chihuly. http://www.chihuly.com/index.html 

Chihuly is a Washington state based artist with works displayed around the world. What makes his work somewhat different is that each piece is created by a team of artists.

It was so stunning, that it is worth a close-up.

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I liked this so much that it is now our desktop picture on this computer. If you have a way to zoom in on the picture, the ribbed texture of the glass comes through.

There were many other pieces throughout the gardens, but these are the only ones I photographed. We had arrived later in the afternoon and the gardens were closing early for a Valentine event of wine and chocolate, so we had to scoot along at an undesirable pace in order to see as much as possible.

We’ll just have to go back!

The first and only other time we had been there they had the giant, wooden bugs on exhibit. (We stood under this ant!) http://www.big-bugs.com/

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And the praying mantis towered over the tallest.

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We will just have to keep a check on the webpage to see what other special exhibits can be expected.

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