This past week I had the joy to return to the museum setting and put the finishing touches on a project that has been in development since the fall of 2008. Lynn Whitelaw, Director of the Leepa-Rattner Museum of Art on the Tarpon Springs campus of St. Petersburg College, invited me as guest curator for the exhibit Dean Mitchell: Visions with Heart & Soul. On view through May 2^nd, this exhibit features a diversely talented artist whose breadth and depth of style, technique, subject, and medium is extremely rare.

Collaborating with Mitchell has been a wonderful journey of insight, respect, and perspective. Becoming increasingly familiar with he and his work has only added to my respect of him as an artist and a positive soul in a world and time that often leaves one wishing for a simpler day and times with less negativity.

Fun too was the opportunity to work with the staff of the Leepa-Rattner Museum of Art. Throughout the process of coordinating loans of Mitchell’s work from California to New York and many places in between, to revising the checklist, to snow storms leaving us wondering if loan works would arrive on time, and installing the works as track lighting malfunctions; it’s all part of the process that keeps us on our toes and adept at crisis management.

This past weekend the Museum  hosted a very successful opening reception to its membership, with over 300 in attendance. It was a pleasure to meet many family, friends, collectors, and supporters of Mitchell’s work and of the Leepa-Rattner Museum. Many programming opportunities support the exhibit including a Family Day celebration on March 27, 2010 which will include my interview with Dean Mitchell at 2pm.

A full-color catalogue accompanies the exhibit and includes a checklist of all 65 works in the exhibit, many of which are illustrated, and my essay regarding the amazing work of Dean Mitchell. I strongly encourage you to treat yourself to Mitchell’s work; I promise you will not be disappointed.

In addition to the publication of the companion catalogue for this exhibit, I just received a copy of a long-awaited academic publication Encounters with Mycenaean Figures and Figurines. This publication presents the papers delivered during a seminar at the Swedish Institute at Athens, Greece. The paper I presented at this seminar, “Figurines, cultic space and the miniature vase,” is included among these proceedings.

Post Script: This past Wednesday evening Dean Mitchell was honored at the Governor’s Mansion in Tallahassee, FL as the Featured Artist for the State’s celebration of Black History Month for 2010. Are we on the cutting edge or what; Congrats Dean!