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Downtown St. Petersburg, Fla., skyline at night. Image by Ryan Abel. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic license.

Tampa Bay-area executive plans new art museum

Tom Hoepf
Tom Hoepf

Downtown St. Petersburg, Fla., skyline at night. Image by Ryan Abel. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic license.
Downtown St. Petersburg, Fla., skyline at night. Image by Ryan Abel. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic license.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) – A Tampa Bay-area executive has committed up to $75 million of his personal fortune to building a new art museum in St. Petersburg.

The Tampa Bay Times that 72-year-old Tom James has amassed more than 2,500 pieces of art. James is the executive chairman of Raymond James Financial Inc., which was founded by his father.

Though his collection includes other genres, it’s best known for its Western and wildlife art. About 400 of the best examples in those genres would make up the permanent collection that he would give to the museum.

Assessing the value of art is always a moving target, but James estimates that the group would probably be valued between $20 million and $25 million. He has identified several potential museum sites in St. Petersburg.

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Information from: Tampa Bay Times (St. Petersburg, Fla.), http://www.tampabay.com .

Copyright 2014. Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

AP-WF-11-03-14 0802GMT

ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE

Downtown St. Petersburg, Fla., skyline at night. Image by Ryan Abel. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic license.
Downtown St. Petersburg, Fla., skyline at night. Image by Ryan Abel. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic license.