The Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg is replacing a display of 476 objects, including small items, with about 350 works, swapping chronological order for thematic groupings that put an installation depicting Justin Bieber as a contemporary deity, crafted by Guatemalan wood-carvers, in conversation with traditional Christian icons. The reinstalled galleries, called Art Unbound, open to the public on Saturday, Nov. 21.
The museum holds more than 20,000 objects total, ranging from pieces thousands of years old to contemporary work, according to Creative Loafing Tampa. Because so much of that holding is light-sensitive, only a fraction can be displayed at any given time, which is part of why the museum settled on a thematic model rather than its old chronological layout.
The idea for the overhaul came from MFA Executive Director and CEO Klaudio Rodriguez, a former executive director of the Bronx Museum, per the outlet's reporting. Rodriguez said the new approach makes the museum experience more personal, interactive and engaged, and he told the publication he hopes the collection gets rearranged again every three or four years rather than sitting static.
Bieber as Deity, Mickey Mouse as Florida Icon
The reorganized galleries include themed rooms such as Picturing Belief, American Landscapes, Materials & Techniques, Setting the Table, Death & The Spirit World, and Utterly Florida, the report states. Picturing Belief pairs traditional Christian iconography with an installation by artist Paul Pfeiffer depicting Justin Bieber as a contemporary deity, carved by Guatemalan wood-carvers.
Utterly Florida leans into the state's own visual mythology, setting a James Rosenquist abstract alongside a Mickey Mouse tea set designed by Michael Graves and a 19th-century St. Augustine landscape by Thomas Moran, the same account notes. MFA Chief Curator Stanton Thomas said the galleries are meant to prompt visitors to consider why particular objects have been combined in the first place.
Elsewhere, a Telling Stories gallery explores the relationship between art and narrative through myth, legend and folklore, featuring a Calvin Hunt crest pole, a miniature Noah's Ark, and a visitor conversation pit, per the same account. A Discovery Room strips away wall labels entirely, leaving only QR codes so visitors have to guess what they're looking at before scanning for answers.
Two-Month Closure, Software-Mapped Layouts
Curators used the interior design program SketchUp to plan where every object would go, completing the full reinstallation in just two months after the collection closed in September 2026, the article reports. During that closure the museum kept its special exhibition galleries, gift shop and Café Clementine open to visitors.
That timeline tracks with earlier notice from the museum itself: Art Unbound encompasses not just the permanent collection but changes to indoor galleries, transitional spaces and the outdoor campus, according to the Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg. The institution has also said an immersive installation by artist Yvette Mayorga in its historic 1965 entrance hall will serve as the first exhibition in a new Great Hall Project, and that the MFA Shop and Café Clementine will eventually be redesigned as well.
Ahead of the full reopening, St. Pete Catalyst reported in September that the museum planned to temporarily close several collection galleries between Sept. 21 and Nov. 21 for this phase of Art Unbound, while its main gallery, the Hazel Hough Wing, stayed open throughout.
Not the Museum's First Reshuffle
This isn't the first time MFA St. Pete has torn up its own floor plan. The collection was last refreshed six years earlier, in a 2020 renovation that the Tampa Bay Times reported brought a new layout, enhanced lighting and a different rotation of works when those galleries reopened to the public on Oct. 27, 2020.
Art Unbound goes further, folding in works that have rarely or never been exhibited alongside loaned pieces, the recent account notes. For St. Petersburg residents who have walked the same chronological galleries for years, the reopening on Nov. 21 offers a genuinely rearranged museum, with familiar pieces now sitting in unfamiliar company.
