Children’s class at the Art Club, 1934. Photos courtesy of the St. Petersburg Museum of History
We’ve Always Had Art: Remembering the Originals By Tina Stewart Brakebill As this month’s SHINE St. Petersburg Mural Festival reminds us, art thrives in St. Pete. In addition to our diverse array of public art, we have world-class museums, active independent galleries and artist markets. The depth and breadth of this current vibrancy sometimes invites comparison with the not-so-distant past, when some saw the city as a cultural and social wasteland. Those harsh recollections are not completely accurate; we’ve always had art. The city’s director of cultural affairs, Wayne Atherholt, may have said it best in a 2018 interview: “Even
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back in those early days … art was significant. It’s part of the city’s DNA.”
The early days: waterfront visions and mid-winter fairs In 1903, the year of the city’s incorporation, William Straub, an artist and owner/editor of the St. Petersburg Times, painted an idyllic view of the waterfront as he imagined it could be. No doubt that vision
