Playing Hooky (2.8.24)

While we worked full-time, Dave and I both kept strict office hours.  Suddenly, after David fully retired and I began working part-time, we could slip away on weekday afternoons, with nobody to wonder where we were or accuse us of playing hooky. On February 8, 2024, we celebrated that freedom by spending Thursday afternoon at the Springfield Museum of Art, south of Provo. 
 

The attraction was an exhibition of the art collection of Gayle Miller and Kim Wilson, former members of our ward (Church congregation) and friends.  Gayle was formerly married to Larry Miller, owner of a chain of car dealerships and movie theaters, as well as the Utah JAZZ.  He was one of the richest men in Utah.  After Larry died, Gayle married Kim, a prominent lawyer in Salt Lake who is as interested as Gayle is in LDS history and art.

The collection included statues of basketball players, in tribute to the Utah JAZZ.

There were wonderful religious paintings, including works by CCA Christensen, one of the LDS pioneer painters from the mid-1800s.

There were paintings by Minerva Teichert, the prolific LDS painter who studied with prominent American painter Robert Henri in New York and then painted murals for the Manti temple, as well as many paintings of Christ and of scenes from the Book of Mormon.

Gayle has Danish heritage, and so there were religious paintings from 19th century Danish artists.

There were also paintings of Salt Lake City, as it would have looked in the 1890s, when the Salt Lake Temple had just been completed.

The artistic viewpoint of this painting is from somewhere in the Avenues, looking down and west at Temple Square.  Both Gayle and Kim, and Dave and I, have spent many years living in the Avenues.

My favorite religious painting was this depiction of the lion lying down with the lamb, as Isaiah predicted would happen in the last days.  The painting was a special Christmas gift from Larry to Gayle, commissioned from the artist Nancy Glazier.

I was also charmed by this painting by the modern Utah artist, James Christensen.  He portrays himself, a creative type, as tethered firmly to earth by his no-nonsense wife!  Christensen noted, in the description of the painting, "I would just float up into the air and pop somewhere if I didn't have her holding onto the other end."  Their marriage was a good partnership!