Daily Archives: July 10, 2012

Views from Chihuly Nights at the Dallas Arboretum: 9

Preamble: The Czarina has been a very enthusiastic fan of the glass artist Dale Chihuly for as long as I’ve known her. Me, I’ve been looking for a good excuse to visit the Dallas Arboretum, especially at night, for years. Last Wednesday, we celebrated Independence Day not in the usual manner, but by having a date night at the Arboretum’s Chihuly Nights exhibition. Explanations of what you’re seeing may or may not follow: if you have questions, get out here before November 5 to see it yourself.

Chihuly 13

I’m the last person who will fuss about visitors arriving at a particular time to see the Chihuly exhibition at the Dallas Arboretum, but I do recommend coming out for the Chihuly Nights shows (currently, running Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday nights) about an hour or two before dark. This way, you get a chance to see the displays and how they interact with the rest of the gardens, before night falls, the lights come on, and the foliage disappears into the black.

Chihuly 14

At around dusk, visitors start noticing something interesting and a bit disturbing. Contrary to suspicions, the sculptures aren’t lit internally. Instead, they’re illuminated through cunningly hidden spotlights, and the refractive properties of glass do the rest.

Chihuly 15

Chihuly 16

Chihuly 17

When I first started posting these, a few smartaleck friends joked “”Chihuly? I first read that as ‘Cthulhu’. In this grotto, with this lighting on glass this color, I can’t disagree that there’s quite a bit of H.P. Lovecraft in the air on a hot summer Dallas night.

Chihuly 18

Chihuly 19

Chihuly 20

More strangeness from the Dallas Arboretum

While wandering about like lunatics at the Dallas Arboretum last week, we realized that one of the biggest problems with twilight is getting decent photos with my camera. I’m already acknowledging my deficiencies in the form, and these may or may not be cured with practice, training, or surgery. However, trying to get a good focus on an item that’s moving too fast to capture (such as the hummingbird hawkmoth we spotted feeding on sedum flowers) isn’t helped when you barely have enough light to see by.

Julia Child roses

This little trip also made me appreciate the inherent UV fluorescence of many flowers, including roses. Naturally, the Dallas Arboretum has yellow roses. Not only do they threaten to take your Texas Resident card away if you don’t have them in your garden in Texas, but all sorts of horrible things happen to you if you don’t keep at least one bush of them at all times. You can’t get decent seats at restaurants. The only spots in movie theaters are directly behind dolts who text through the entire movie. Your favorite bars suddenly become hipster hangouts. Worst of all, if you don’t keep them going, the only time you can get decent seats for a Texas Rangers baseball game is when the Rangers are doing worse than the Chicago Cubs. The Cubs.

So we found the yellow roses in the Arboretum. However, since anybody who develops a new rose cultivar can name it whatever s/he wants, take a look at who was honored with this variety?

Julia Child rose sign

Suddenly, I don’t mind yellow roses quite so much. It also makes me want to develop a variety of miniature black rose and name it after Ralph Steadman.

Interview time

Not that I’m obsessed with tooting my own horn (he said, the automatic self-promotion inhibitor attached to the back of his skull threatening to turn his brain into charcoal), but Emily Goldsher over at the Grower’s Supply Blog contacted me for an interview back at the beginning of June, and the first half is now online. Now I’m just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Views from Chihuly Nights at the Dallas Arboretum: 8

Preamble: The Czarina has been a very enthusiastic fan of the glass artist Dale Chihuly for as long as I’ve known her. Me, I’ve been looking for a good excuse to visit the Dallas Arboretum, especially at night, for years. Last Wednesday, we celebrated Independence Day not in the usual manner, but by having a date night at the Arboretum’s Chihuly Nights exhibition. Explanations of what you’re seeing may or may not follow: if you have questions, get out here before November 5 to see it yourself.

Chihuly 6

Chihuly 7

Chihuly 8

Chihuly 9

Chihuly 10

Chihuly 11

Chihuly 12