'Oscar de la Renta: The Retrospective' at the de Young

"A garden is probably the most spiritual and purest of joys. It's a communion with nature and beauty in the most simple and fundamental form," said Oscar de la Renta, shortly before he passed, in 2014. Himself a talented gardener, the designer was beloved for his exceptional floral prints. Now open at the de Young Museum, Oscar de la Renta: The Retrospective, is a full-bloom tribute to the dazzling career of a man who truly celebrated life. (from 7x7)."

Cynic that I am, I would add that he celebrated life among and for the wealthy and made himself very rich doing so. The exhibit celebrates the thin, the famous and those with deep, deep pocketbooks. I can assure you that nobody at the Gala wore a Mohawk hairdo. The Chairwoman of the Board of the FAMSF was ecstatic. Why have an exhibit of serious art when you can show couture for wealthy women?

http://www.examiner.com/article/oscar-de-la-renta-a-retrospective-at-the-de-young-museum

Spring shows at the Asian Art Museum

"Pearls on a string" at the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco

"Pearls on a String: Artists, Patrons and Poets at the Great Islamic Courts." In May 2013, the National Endowment for the Humanities made a gift to the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore that underwrote an exhibition drawn in part from its collection of Islamic art and manuscripts. That exhibit has now traveled to San Francisco. In a journey spanning the 16th through 18th centuries, "Pearls on a String" takes viewers to through three Islamic capitals to answer the question "Who's behind the art?"

http://www.examiner.com/article/spring-shows-at-the-asian-art-museum