Fanciful, colorful glass sculptures are sprouting along with flowers and trees at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum in Chanhassen.

They're part of a summer exhibit called "Nature in Glass: The Wonders of Craig Mitchell Smith" that visitors will encounter as they walk through the arboretum's gardens and landscapes, as well as inside the Oswald Visitor Center.

The exhibit, sponsored by Wells Fargo, is up now and continues through Aug. 31.

The radiant works include images of butterflies, fish, waves, fire and flowers.

Smith, a self-taught artist who lives in Michigan, has exhibited his glass artwork at gardens and attractions around the country, including Disney's Epcot Center, Norfolk Botanical Garden and Dow Gardens. He begin his artistic work as a painter and embraced glass as a medium in 2005.

"I love glass for its metaphors of the human condition," he said in an arboretum news release. "At its best, it is colorful and transparent, brittle when cold and malleable when warm, stronger than it looks, enduring the ages if treated with care and respect."

Glass art and the arboretum's gardens are a natural fit, said arboretum director Ed Schneider. Smith's works "showcase and complement the beauty of our plants and landscape and the gifts of nature," he said.

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