Art is Alive at SDMA

Apr. 29 – May 1

The San Diego Museum of Art is drenched in great beauty this month. Brueghel to Canaletto: European Masterpieces from the Grasset Collection opens April 2, offering viewers paintings from the Golden Age. Many of the 17th century’s finest European still life and landscape paintings are featured in this show, highlighted by the work of Canaletto, familiar to art enthusiasts for his beautiful paintings of Venetian canals. Also included are paintings of everyday life in the Netherlands by Barent Avercamp, and still life canvasses by Spanish artist Juan van der Hamen y Leon. The focus shifts to Asia with the April 29 opening of Brush and Ink: Chinese paintings from The San Diego Museum of Art, on view until September 4.

Art Alive, that glorious celebration of floral arrangements and art from the museum’s permanent collection, also opens on April 29, and closes on May 1. The hugely successful floral art event, in its 35th year, takes its inspiration this time from Brush and Ink and other exceptional pieces from the Asian art collection. This year, Jim Lennox and Ben Lucero of Pacific Event Productions will transform the museum’s central rotunda into a lush and beautiful floral design and art experience. Lucero, a renowned floral designer with more than 20 years of experience, will add a new twist to an old Asian tradition with a rotunda design encompassing the creativity, emotion, and powerful energy embodied by the element of fire. 619.232.7931, sdmart.org DARLENE G. DAVIES

Art is Alive at SDMA