Megan and Murray McMillan

Magdalena Abakanowicz, Bronze Crowd, 1990-91

It’s only since we’ve been in Dallas this month that I’ve come to realize the extensiveness of the renaissance that’s happening in this city, particularly in the arts and cultural realm. Of course, this has been in process for a long time, but now that buildings are finished or heavily under construction and roads are re-routed and whole blocks have been removed, the difference is visceral. Dallas is an entirely different city than it was even ten years ago.

The arts district is one of the areas that is the most changed. The Nasher is open just a block away from the Dallas Museum of Art. The new opera house is nearing completion next-door to I.M. Pei’s Meyerson Concert Hall. My old high school, the arts magnet, just a few blocks from the museums, is shut down while it’s being renovated by the same firm that designed the Contemporary in St Louis.

That’s to say nothing of the proposed Calatrava bridge over the Trinity River. Or the just-built Victory Park with its postmodern digital “Kunsthalle.” This city has some serious momentum.

With all the change, it was really reassuring to visit some familiar faces at the same museum where I spent many teenage hours avoiding the heat and trying to stay off the radar of my demanding orchestra director.

Hello, Spanish Elegy, you old friend.

Robert Motherwell, Elegy to the Spanish Republic 108 (The Barcelona Elegy), 1966