The Saint Louis Art Museum

One can easily spend a whole afternoon in the St Louis Art Museum and not begin to see what is offered here. This still leaves the rest of Forest Park with its zoo and many other attractions. It is here up on Art Hill that the grid for the 1904 St Louis World's Fair was laid out from in the shape of a fan. It's focal point was to be Festival Hall. Behind Festival Hall and obscured from normal view was the Palace of Fine Arts later to be called the St Louis Art Museum. This was to be the only permanent building that would remain after the seven month World's Fair would end. Whereas the other world's fair palaces were built of wood and stucco the Palace of Fine Arts was built to last out of much more expensive materials. The Palace of Fine Arts would wind up costing a million dollars, a very large sum back in those days while even larger structures would come in at around the half million dollar mark.

There is a lot to see here. And if you think you've seen it all the exhibits keep changing. For instance for October 6th-December 30th, 2001 Tadao Ando, world renowned Japanese architect is being featured in a series of related events. For further information call 314-721-0072 or click on the St Louis Art Museum's official web site at http://www.slam.org