Staff members at Selby Botanical Gardens admit they may have gotten carried away with inspiration while designing their latest art-meets-nature exhibition “Roy Lichtenstein: Monet’s Garden Goes Pop!”
“We just went a little crazy,” said Mike McLaughlin, the director of horticulture, who worked with a team of staff members to transform the conservatory and grounds into an assortment of whimsical displays that reflect Lichtenstein’s Pop art interpretations of classic works by French Impressionist painter Claude Monet of his gardens in Giverny, France, and his famed haystacks.
“There was a lot to work from,” McLaughlin said of the latest entry in the Jean and Alfred Goldstein Exhibition Series, which opens today and continues through June 27 at Selby’s downtown Sarasota campus. The series has previously featured botanical-related art work by Marc Chagall, Paul Gauguin, Andy Warhol and Salvador Dali.