North Light Studios

I’ve been holding off on this one, simply because I know it so well and could go on forever about it. But the Springville Museum of Art is one of the best museums I’ve ever been to. So why am I talking about it now? Because it’s director, Dr. Vern Swanson, is retiring this August. I’m both hopeful and fearful for whoever is taking his place, because he is seriously irreplaceable. I’ll start with the exterior. The building was originally a high school, built in Spanish Colonial style . Two paintings were donated to the school, which transformed into a museum when a bigger high school was built. The step-down gallery is home to exhibitions, whatever the flavor-of-the-month is. From the International Spring Salon that runs May through July every year, to the Quilt Show in the fall, there is always something fantastic to see here. I admit, Mike’s piece is in that room right now, and I love to go look at it, along with the other pieces. Each room on the main level is spacious and...

Ten years ago (okay, maybe eleven) I stepped foot in one of the most extraordinary and fascinating structures every built by mankind. I knew very little about it; in fact, I’d never heard of it until I met my husband. “The Hermitage?” I had said. “What is that?” “Oh, it’s amazing,” my husband replied. And it was. The walls were lined with ornate patterns weaving in and out of each other; trim inlaid with gold adorned the most magnificent architecture I’d ever laid eyes on. Not only that, but it was a museum, filled to the brim with the treasures of Leonardo da Vinci, Rafael, Simone Martini, Peter Paul Reubens, Jean-Honore Fragonard, Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Claude Monet, Michelangelo, Antonio Canova (my favorite!), Auguste Rodin, and Jean-Antoine Houdon. And these exhibits are just the icing on the cake. We were lucky, while there, to find that the Hermitage was hosting an exhibition of ancient Egypt, including mummy corpses and Egy...

One summer a couple of years ago I was lucky enough to take a trip to San Francisco with my family. We went to the beach, found some excellent places to eat, and drove around the city for a day, looking for fun and interesting things to see. We had our GPS Navigation system with us, so we decided to look up nearby attractions. “Palace of the Legion of Honor? What’s that?” I asked my husband. “It sounds familiar. And cool. Let’s go there,” he replies. So we do. Outside are two fantastic monumental sculptures, and that reminds him. “It’s a museum!” We’ve struck gold, because in our family, art is one of our highest priorities (happens when one of you is a sculptor). So we stop, drag everyone out of the car (including our very happy son, who gets carsick), and start toward the building. It’s amazing. My husband stops to look at the outdoor sculptures before going in; El Cid (Spanish war hero) and Joan of Arc, by Anna Hyatt Huntington. Captivating. Stared for a long time, while kids ran a...

After a long hiatus, I am returning to the blog. This post will be a short, a sort of intro to the year 2012. Here goes. This year I would like to focus on Museums. Each month I will spotlight a museum of art (or at least a museum that showcases some type of art) from somewhere on this earth. I've got a lot of museums in mind, including (but not limited to) The Hermitage, The Louvre, The Met, and some not as well known museums, including the Palace of the Legion of Honor. I'll also include occasional updates from North Light Studio. Suggestions and comments are always welcome. See you in about a week! -Penny Lane