There is a marvelous collection of paintings and statuary collected by the youngest Ringling brother, John, who died in the 1930s, and given to the state of Florida on his death.

It is located in Sarasota in the midst of a university campus and a splendid repertory theatre,  a little Shakespeare with The Winter’s Tale, and some Moliere, a play by Steven Dietz and maybe some others that I have missed. Recommended.

We saw one of Steven Dietz’s plays at the last: The Invention of Van Gogh. Of course, he played around with time as always seems to do, sometimes so quickly the characters had to change right on stage. A minor problem was that you needed a little art history to understand some of the stuff and there was a fair amount of gentle poking of fun at the post-moderns who hide out at our college campuses. Dan Donoghue was a brilliant Vincent Van Gogh. Pretty good stuff.

The top one is a David, I suppose a copy of the famous one in Florence. The one to the right is a copy of that famous ending of WWII picture in Life Magazine.

And the one to the left was in the courtyard of the Ringling Museum. Don’t know who it is by or when but I couldn’t help seeing some similarities with the one above.

If anything, the one to the left is a little more startling and eye-arresting.

This is only a small sample of the things to see and marvel at in this very nice place. The Ringling Bros Circus Museum is worth the price of admission right there.

Lots of things going on at St Pat’s Co-Cathedral this past weekend. In addition to the usual masses and other sacramental happenings, Bishop Michael Warfel joined us for the Rites of Sending and Election with the RCIA people of this part of the diocese. The picture to the left is from the narthex looking toward the altar with the baptismal font directly in front of you.

And we were graced by the presence of Fathers Nigro and Beuzer, right and left below, who led a very well-received Lenten retreat. That picture to the left is the marvelous recent stained glass addition to the narthex: The Tree of Life.

Even with the best stories in the world we still need to tell them well. These guys reminded us how to do this extremely well.

Where Are We Toto?

These may be too easy questions. But in these difficult economic times I thought it would feel good to get something right. What is the name of this building? In which direction am I driving or walking and on what street? How come present day architects or builders don’t do decorative things like this? Why do Senior High and Skyview High look so much better than West High? Enquiring minds want to know.

I’ll keep updating as they’re posted.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9

Part 10