Bayou Bend in Bloom! The Annual Garden Party Returns

Wilson Parish and Jenny Antill
Bayou Bend in Bloom! The Annual Garden Party Returns

Tina Pyne and Terrry Wayne Jones

THE SUMMER HEAT can be oppressive, yes — but after more than a year cooped up with minimal socializing taking place, Houstonians say bring it on!


The Museum of Fine Arts' Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens welcomed 200 guests to its annual garden party, where they mingled happily in the picturesque gardens. Dinner, catered by City Kitchen, was comprised of summer-savvy comfort food, a la chilled pea soup, fried chicken, succotash — and a pecan-crusted ice cream ball with chocolate sauce. It was all set under a towering tent with stunning centerpieces of white and green tulips and eucalyptus, and was followed by a performance by popular party band Doppelganger.

In all, the evening raised nearly half a million for the Bayou Bend operating budget.

Ann and John Bookout

Bobbie Nau and Marc Grossberg

Kelly and Tony Duenner

Patrick and Bridget Wade

Lane Ware; Emma Willingham; Kay and Stuart Duenner

Polly and Murry Bowden

Reed and Laurie Morian; Gary Tinterow and Christopher Gardner

Sarah and David Larned

Vivian Vanden Bout; Lauren Brollier; Mary Margaret Brollier

Parties

Sarah Sudhoff (photo by Katy Anderson)

SINCE THE 1970s, Houston’s cultural scene has only grown richer and more diverse thanks to the DIY spirit of its visual artists. As an alternative to the city’s major museums (which are awesome) and commercial galleries (again, awesome), they show their work and the work of their peers in ad-hoc, cooperative, artist-run spaces — spaces that range from the traditional white cube interiors, to private bungalows, to repurposed shipping containers.

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Art + Entertainment

Matthew Dirst (photo by Jacob Power)

FOR FANS OF early music — an often scholarly lot who aren’t afraid to wear their hearts on their sleeves — bad-boy Baroque-era painter Caravaggio certainly nailed something in his dramatic 1595 painting, “The Musicians.” (Simon Schama talks about this in his TV series The Power of Art.) One look at his masterpiece, and you feel as if you’ve stumbled upon and surprised a roomful of dewy-eyed musicians, their youthful faces swollen with melancholy, with the lutist looking like he’s about ready to burst into tears before he’s even tuned his instrument. So no, you certainly don’t need a Ph.D. to enjoy and be moved by the music of Handel, G.P. Telemann, or J.S. Bach, but a little bit of scholarship never hurt anyone. Knowing the history of this music may even deepen your appreciation of it.

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