Model Chicago

Posted on April 25, 2017 by admin

Most Chicago Architectural Foundation tours begin at 224 S. Michigan Ave., where the foundation is located and which is also known as the Santa Fe Center or, originally, the Railway Exchange Building. It’s a handsome structure by Daniel Burnham, dating from 1904.

“A building around a light well, a form common to Daniel H. Burnham’s work from the mid-1880s onward, received an undulating white-glazed terra-cotta skin, oriel bays, and a top floor of distinctive porthole windows,” notes the AIA Guide to Chicago. “As in the Rookery, there is a two-story covered court at the base of the light well dominated by a grand staircase.”

The view from near the grand staircase.
Note the model of Chicago taking up much of the floor. At 25 by 35 feet, it’s an exact model of every building in more than four square miles of the city, or more than 1,000 of them. The obviously skilled Columbian Model & Exhibit Works created it for the Chicago Architectural Foundation in the late 2000s.

The Tribune reported in 2009 that the “model buildings came from Columbian’s workshop. The exhibit is broken down into 400 city blocks, in squares the size of dinner plates carried in food caterer’s serving carts. With the buildings already glued in place, the blocks were placed into the exhibit like waiters carefully placing food plates into a buffet table.

“[Foundation VP Gregory] Dreicer said the first step in the process was creating a digitized three-dimensional computer model of the city that could be manipulated on a screen. The designers did it using architectural drawings or drawings purchased from commercial firms that collect such information.

“To make each building, they went to firms that use the three-dimensional printing process called stereolithography, used to make design prototypes of various products like plastic containers for food, cleaning or pharmaceutical products.”

Wow. That’s impressive. And right there, for anyone to walk in and see, no charge. It’s not a static display, either. I’ve read that the CAF updates it periodically, as buildings come and go in Chicago.

Two Churches & One Temple in Old Town

Posted on April 20, 2017 by admin

Towering over N. Cleveland and W. Eugenie Sts. in the Old Town neighborhood of Chicago is St. Michael’s, a Romanesque Catholic church dating from just before the Great Chicago Fire. Not good timing, since the building was thus in the path of the conflagration.

“As the fire moved past Holy Name Cathedral, religious from nearby institutions rushed to St. Michael’s for respite, but they knew that the fire was just a few hours away,” the church tells us at its web site. “Priests, brothers, and nuns, helped by parishioners, packed parish treasures onto an oxcart and fled. Soon, flames tore into all the parish buildings, leveling all of them. Only the walls of the church remained standing.”

By 1873, the church had been rebuilt, though various modifications have occurred since then.

Look closely up there and you see the Archangel Michael, sword drawn, ready to do battle with Old Scratch and his minions.
The interior looks like this: Bavarian Baroque, according to the AIA Guide to Chicago.

The archangel is also depicted outside on the plaza, facing the church. His sword is at his side, after vanquishing Old Scratch (at least, I assume that’s Satan underfoot). Good thing none of the nearby telephone wires were damaged in the struggle.
The plaza itself is a pedestrian zone that cuts the flow of cars on that section of Eugenie St. That’s unusual. I can’t think of another church in Chicago that has one. It helps make that part of Old Town distinct.

A few blocks to the north, at Wisconsin and Orleans, is the less distinct — at least as a building — Church of the Three Crosses, which is affiliated with both the United Church of Christ and the United Methodist Church.
Around back, however, is a sign of the times.
Roughly between St. Michael’s and the Church of the Three Crosses, on W. Menomonee, is the Midwest Buddhist Temple, a temple of the Jodo Shinshu school of Buddhism.

“Jodo Shinshu, also referred to as Shin Buddhism, was founded in Japan by Shinran Shonin (1173-1262),” explains the temple’s web site. “It was Shinran Shonin who made Buddhist teachings accessible to people of all walks of life — in contrast to the traditional, primarily monastic practice of Buddhism.

“Between 1900 and 1940, many Jodo Shinshu temples were founded along the West Coast of the United States. But it wasn’t until 1944 that the Midwest Buddhist Temple was founded in Chicago by Rev. Gyodo Kono — its beginning linked to the ‘resettlement’ of many Japanese-Americans who moved to the Midwest to start new lives as World War II came to a close.”

At the edge of the property is a small but lovely garden, designed by Hoichi Kurisu of Portland, Ore., who also did the Anderson Gardens in Rockford.

“The boulders, set into place by a 30-ton crane, were especially important in representing the topographical features of Shinran Shonin’s walk from Mt. Hiei to the people in the Japanese villages as he spread the teachings of Shin Buddhism.”

Luckily, these days there are funiculars connecting Mt. Hiei with the rest of Japan.

The Rockford Art Museum

Posted on April 17, 2017 by admin

The Riverfront Museum Campus in Rockford is, true to its name, next to the Rock River in that northern Illinois city, though the entrance to the complex actually faces a parking lot.

There are a handful of outdoor sculptures on the campus. Here’s one — “The Juggler,” by David J. Foster (2010) — that would be fun to have in the back yard. Except for maintenance costs and all the unwanted attention it would attract, especially at first.
The campus, which opened in the early 1990s, includes the Discovery Center Museum, Northern Public Radio, Rockford Art Museum, Rockford Dance Company and some part of the Rockford Symphony Orchestra, though that group performs at the ornate Coronado Theater. I’m pretty sure that the Discovery Center, which is a children’s museum, hasn’t been there that long, but relocated in more recent years. I remember taking the kids there more than 10 years ago, and while I couldn’t say exactly where we went, it wasn’t near the river.

This time we came to visit the Rockford Art Museum. Its four rooms, two upstairs, two downstairs, maintain a spare aesthetic.
The museum has some interesting items. That’s all I ask of most museums. Here’s a detail of “Indigo Deux” by Ed Paschke (1988).

Another detail, this one of “Millennium 16/The Launderer” by Steven Hudson (1993).

“Condor” by Les Sandelman (1987).
And “Not Knot #18” by Jackie Kazarian (1991).
All in all, a small but good museum. Worth the relatively short drive to Rockford, as are the Nicholas Conservatory, Klehm Arboretum and Anderson Japanese Gardens.

Before we visited the museum, we ate a tasty lunch at a Vietnamese restaurant in Rockford. We were sitting at a large table in the back because all the smaller tables were full, and some other patrons were sitting at the table as well. One of them, a young woman who introduced herself as Sally, asked whether we’d eaten there before. No, this is our first time. We’re from out of town.

She said she was from Rockford, and seemed a little surprised that anyone would come to town just for a visit. I assured here that we turn up once a year or so, in this case to see the museum. I’m all for visiting large art museums with sprawling collections — be they in Brooklyn or Arkansas or far-off Russia — but smaller art museums are generally worth a look as well. Smaller cities are, too.

Mount Carmel Cemetery, Hillside

Posted on April 11, 2017 by admin

Demographic note: a lot more people reside in Mount Carmel Cemetery in west suburban Hillside, Ill., than in the village itself. The cemetery has about 226,000 permanent residents, while the village has only about 8,100 (living) people. But the advantage goes to the living, of course. For instance, they can vote in Cook County elections; most of the dead people can’t.

I’ve known about Mount Carmel for years, but only got around to visiting last week, on a cool and partly cloudy afternoon. The cemetery is thick with upright stones —

… funerary art —

… and mausoleums. In fact, there are a lot of family mausoleums there, about 400, including these three.
At Mount Carmel, one learns that the Lord is a Cubs fan.
On a hillock in the middle of the cemetery is the Bishops’ Chapel, or Bishops’ Mausoleum, but in full the Mausoleum and Chapel of the Archbishops of Chicago, complete with Gabriel blowing his horn.
Inside are the remains of seven bishops, archbishops and auxiliary bishops of Chicago, mostly recently Joseph Cardinal Bernardin, who was entombed in 1996. I remember in the fall of ’96 seeing his funeral procession cross the Michigan Ave. Bridge from an office window in 35 E. Wacker, where I worked. Presumably they were headed for Mount Carmel.

The book Mount Carmel and Queen of Heaven Cemeteries by Jenny Floro-Khalaf and Cynthia Savaglio gives quite a lot of detail about the Bishops’ Mausoleum, which was completed in 1912. The cemetery itself was established with the new-born century in 1901, long before the Eisenhower Expressway ran to its north, and probably when Roosevelt Road to the south — not yet called that, but 12th St. in the city at least — was very rudimentary indeed.

“[The chapel] was the brainchild of Chicago’s second archbishop, James Quigley, who oversaw its construction,” Floro-Khalaf and Savaglio write. “He engaged a local architect, William J. Brinkmann, who came up with the simple, Romanesque style that embodies the building’s outline. However, in keeping with the aesthetic tastes of his predecessor, Patrick Feehan, Quigley engaged one of the most famous architects of the day, Aristide Leonori, who designed the building’s breathtaking interior… Leonari executed a design reminiscent of Rome in marble and mosaic.”

A locked door was as close as I got to the breathtaking interior, for which I blame wankers who would do harm to it. But over the door, you’re reminded that Quigley built the place.

Many Italian names dot the cemtery’s landscape. Benedetto, Bernardo, DeVito, DiGiovanni, Felicetti, Gazzolo, Genna, Mazzitelli, Salerno, Serritello, Truppa, Perazzo, Porcaro, Porzio, and Viviano were among those I saw, though there was a fair number of Irish names and others mixed in.

One name I didn’t see was Capone. If I’d done any research beforehand, I would have known where to look for Al Capone. The cemetery doesn’t guide visitors to his grave, unlike the signs posted to direct you to the Wright Bros. at the Woodland Cemetery in Dayton or the Hunley crews in Magnolia Cemetery in Charleston. Maybe some other time.

Other mafioso are buried in Mount Carmel, though not as well known as Capone any more. But their stories are no less lurid. Such as Joseph “Hop Toad” Giunta, who ran afoul of Capone in a particularly bloody way, or so the story goes. I didn’t see his grave, either.

Find a Grave says, “He was a high ranking member of the Capone gang who formed a secret alliance with Al Capone enemy Joe Aiello. Giunta planned to kill Capone and take over his operations, and enlisted the help of Capone triggermen John Scalise and Albert Anselmi with the promise of higher positions when Giunta was in power.

“Capone found out about the plan and invited Giunta, Scalise and Anselmi to a dinner party. During dinner Capone brought out an Indian club he’d received as a gift and proceeded to beat the three men to near death. Capone then allegedly finished the job with gunshots…”

Eda Wade’s Malcolm X College Doors

Posted on April 10, 2017 by admin

After leaving the Aon Center, but before leaving downtown last week, I popped over to the Chicago Cultural Center on Michigan Ave., originally completed in 1895 as Chicago’s main public library.
It’s a fine old repurposed building. Whenever I have a few moments and I’m in the area, I like to go in. For the striking staircase at the south entrance, for one thing. Or the building’s splendid GAR Memorial Hall.

The Cultural Center also features a changing assortment of art exhibits. By chance this time I happened across the murals of Eugene “Eda” Wade, which he painted on the steel doors at Malcolm X College, one of the City Colleges of Chicago, from 1971 to ’73.

According to the exhibit, “the inner-staircase door murals at the former Malcolm X College are one of the hidden gems of the Black Arts movement in Chicago, and a remarkable public-art achievement that went largely unnoticed at the time — except to the college’s students, faculty, staff and administrators.

“The 32 double-sided sets of 10′ x 4′ steel doorways were pained by artist-in-residence Eugene “Eda” Wade… At the behest of Malcolm X College president Dr. Charles G. Hurst Jr., campus projects coordinator Rosa C. Moore invited Eda, later a longtime art professor at Kennedy-King College, to paint the institution’s doors ‘so they wouldn’t look like solid black prison doors.’ ”

Solid black, not at all. More doors should be this interesting.

“Along with images that related to department floors (architecture/engineering, sports/athletics, etc.), jazz, and militancy, many of the murals depict the links between ancestral heritage — expressed through ancient Egyptian and West African figures — and an urban present…”

As I was looking at the doors, I wondered, why are they here? Why aren’t they at Malcolm X College still? Then I read a little closer, and found out that the 1968 Miesian building at 1900 W. Van Buren St., long visible from the Eisenhower Expressway, was demolished last year, replaced by a spanking new building nearby. Somehow I missed hearing about that. Glad the doors were saved.

More about them is posted by the indefatigable Jyoti Srivastava at Public Art in Chicago.

Views from Aon

Posted on April 9, 2017 by admin

Recently I attended an event at the Mid-America Club, which happens to be on the 80th floor of the Aon Center, formerly known as the Amoco Building, and if you go back far enough, the Standard Oil Building (for some time after ’73, when it was completed). At 83 floors and 1,136 ft., it’s the third tallest building in Chicago, but that makes it only the 52nd tallest in the world in our time, when China and the UAE have decided that really tall buildings are just fab.

Getting to the 80th floor, I encountered an elevator system I’d never experienced before. There are touchpads at each elevator bank, and you press the number of the floor you want to go to. Then the machine tells you which of the elevator cabs to board to go express to that floor. There are standard elevator buttons inside the cab, but they’ve been covered over by a hard plastic case and are inaccessible. Guess this makes inter-floor transit more efficient. For all I know, this kind of system could be common and not exactly new; I don’t go into that many very tall buildings any more.

I’d been up to the Mid-America Club before, though I couldn’t remember exactly when. Probably as long ago as the early 2000s. It offers a mighty 360-degree view, though this time around it was obscured some by overcast skies.

This is looking west, down at the top of the Prudential Center. Pru II, vintage 1990, has the pointy spire, maybe for zeppelin mooring. Pru I, vintage 1955, is the shorter structure immediately to Pru II’s left, though it was the tallest building in Chicago when new.
Up and to the right, and on the river, with the cupola on top, is 35 E. Wacker, a handsome ’20s building in which I had an office for a few years.

Also seen from this vantage is 150 N. Michigan. Years ago, I ventured onto the exterior of that building, at a place marked by the red oval. It’s a lot safer than it looks like here.

To the northeast, the entirety of Navy Pier, with part of Chicago’s massive Jardine Water Purification Plant behind it. Largest in the world by volume, I’ve read: nearly one billion gallons of water goes through per day.
One of the pictures posted here is shot from Navy Pier, looking back in the direction of the Aon Center (and a lot of other buildings).

To the north, a large chunk of downtown off in the distance: North Michigan Ave. and Streeterville.
To the south, and looking nearly straight down, is Pritzker Pavilion. As seen from ground level in this posting.
The ribbon snaking off to the left is a pedestrian bridge. Officially, the BP Bridge, one of the projects funded by the oil company before its really big sponsorship of a hole in the Gulf of Mexico. Frank Gehry, who did the Gehry-like bandshell, did the bridge too.

Finally, the Bean, or “Cloud Gate.”
From this vantage, looking like a bead of quicksilver surrounded by ants.

The Salvador Dali Museum Bench

Posted on April 2, 2017 by admin

On April 2, 2005, we visited the Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Fla. As wordy as I was before I published pictures at BTST, I didn’t write much about the place. “Housed in a mid-sized, appropriately modernist building, the Dali Museum is all Dali, all the time, as it should be,” was one line. I also considered how the museum came to be in central Florida.

As far as I can tell, I didn’t take a picture of the building. I did take a picture of bench on the grounds. Lots of people have taken pictures of it.

I didn’t realize until I read more about the place today that the Dali has been in a new building since 2011, and apparently the bench was moved to be near the new structure. I don’t remember whether the giant Dali mustache was there in ’05. You’d think I’d remember a thing like that, but memory is a eccentric thief, taking things you’d never expect.

Regarding the new building, the museum web site says, “Designed by architect Yann Weymouth of HOK, it combines the rational with the fantastical: a simple rectangle with 18-inch thick hurricane-proof walls out of which erupts a large free-form geodesic glass bubble known as the ‘enigma.’

“The Enigma, which is made up of 1,062 triangular pieces of glass, stands 75 feet at its tallest point, a twenty-first century homage to the dome that adorns Dali’s museum in Spain. Inside, the Museum houses another unique architectural feature – a helical staircase – recalling Dali’s obsession with spirals and the double helical shape of the DNA molecule.”

Alma Mater, UIUC

Posted on March 29, 2017 by admin

I took Lilly back to school on Sunday. I didn’t do quite as much of a walkabout on the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign campus as I did in January, but I was determined to pause on the way out to see one thing: Alma Mater, a sculpture by Chicago’s own Lorado Taft.

According to UIHistories Project by Kalev Leetaru, “Unveiled on Alumni Day, June 11, 1929, the statue depicts ‘a benign and majestic woman in scholastic robes, who rises from her throne and advances a step with outstretched arms, a gesture of generously greeting her children.’ Behind her stand the twin figures of Labor and Learning, joining hands in a bronze incarnation of the University’s motto.”

This is Labor. The muscular man in the work duds.
Learning, in Classical garb. It would be more interesting if the costuming were reversed, since labor involves learning and learning involves labor, but never mind.

Older pictures of the statue depict a green patina, acquired over time. During the 2010s restoration of the sculpture, that was stripped away, so presumably it now looks a lot like it did when new.

“Conceived in 1922, Alma Mater was cast in 1929 by the American Art Bronze Foundry and paid for by donations by the Alumni Fund and the classes of 1923-1929,” notes Leetaru. “It was crafted by Taft as ‘his gift to the University in commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of his graduation.’ Alma Mater rests on a granite pedestal conceived by Charles Platt.

“The statue was originally placed directly behind the Auditorium, and at night spotlights cast twin shadows of Labor and Learning onto the rear wall of the Auditorium, making them truly larger than life. On August 22, 1962, the Alumni Association moved the sculpture to its present location in front of Altgeld.”

Altgeld being Altgeld Hall, named after the Illinois governor. There’s a bell in that tower, and I took this picture as it was ringing 4 o’clock on Sunday.

“Completed in 1897, Altgeld Hall, originally known as the Library Building, was designed by Nathan Ricker and James McLaren White…” writes Leetaru. “From 1955 to the present, the Department of Mathematics and the Mathematics Library have called the building home.

“The building is an example of Richardsonian Romanesque architecture and the external stonework is pink limestone. The original pink hue may still be seen in the interior of the East entrance.”

Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston

Posted on March 2, 2017 by admin

Out of idle curiosity, I recently Googled “Magnolia Cemetery” and by the most cursory of investigations, found properties of that name not only in Charleston, SC, but also in Augusta, Ga., Mobile, Beaumont, Norfolk, Va., Baton Rouge, Houston, Orange Park, Fla., and Meridian, Miss., just to name some of the Southern spots.

There are also Magnolia Cemeteries in Philadelphia — Pa. — Harrison County, Iowa, and Stark County, Ohio. That might seem odd, but then again certain kinds of magnolia grow in the North. Saw some in Rockford, Ill. Or maybe the Northern cemetery namers just liked the shady, peaceful associations of the magnolia.

Magnolia Cemetery in Charleston got its start in 1850, during the rural cemetery movement of the 19th century. Rural then, but fully in the city now. Still, it’s a peaceful place, full of the things a park-like cemetery should have: old stones, funerary art, mature trees, bushes, flowers, water features, winding trails, memorials evoking local history.

In Charleston, the War Between the States looms large in local history memorialization. Here’s the monument at Soldiers Ground, a section for Confederate dead set aside during the war.
The tablet on this side of the plinth says:

This Bronze preserves the memory of the Heroic Dead from every part of Carolina and from her sister states of the South who fell in the defense of this city.

In proud and grateful remembrance of their devotion, constancy and valour, who against overwhelming odds by sea and by land kept Charleston virgin and invincible to the last.

Interesting turn of phrase, even for a memorial. It would be snide to claim that Charleston’s “virginity” was kept because Sherman had other things to do (that is, burn down Columbia), so never mind. The four flags are the three national Confederate flags, plus the battle flag.

I don’t ever remember seeing CSA sailors at rest, but Magnolia has some, identities unknown.
There’s also a memorial to South Carolinians who fell at Gettysburg.
Elsewhere are reminders not of war death, but plain old death.
There are also specialty stones, such as this memorial of one Abram Mead, a member of the Aetna Fire Engine Company. Or rather Ætna, named for the volcano, I suppose. Nice to find a ligature in stone.

It’s pretty rare to find cause of death on a headstone, but there it is: Departed this life the 15th of September 1852 of Yellow Fever, Aged 21 Years and 6 Months.

Something a little more imposing, near the cemetery’s pond. This Thomas Pinckney isn’t the Pinckney of the Revolution and post-Revolutionary period, but his grandson.

A child’s stone the likes of which I’ve never seen.
Note that in more recent times, someone left a rubber duck and toy bear for the girl, Rosalie Raymond White, who lived for a few months in 1882.

Finally, the three crews of the H.L. Hunley are interred at Magnolia Cemetery, each crew with modern memorial stones, and stones for the individuals as well, each with a Stainless Banner.

The third crew were entombed in their vessel for about 135 years (their stones are in the row pictured above). The Hunley was raised in 2000 and, presumably after the forensic archaeologists had had a long look at the crew’s bones, they were buried at Magnolia in 2004 with considerable ceremony.

The Cemetery of the Serbian Orthodox Monastery of St. Sava, Lake County

Posted on January 31, 2017 by admin

After leaving Marytown on Saturday, I headed north on Milwaukee Ave. A few miles from of Libertyville’s lively main streets, in an area not quite rural — call it exurban — is the St. Sava Serbian Orthodox Cemetery. At least, that’s a form of the name, since there’s wording in English and Serbian over a gate to the property that calls the entire place (in English), the Serbian Orthodox Monastery of St. Sava.

Near the cemetery is a church, presumably the monastery’s church (more about which later). I didn’t investigate any of the other buildings off in the distance, which are presumably the places for monks to live and otherwise follow their vocation. The map also tells me that St. Sava College is a little ways up the road.

Anyway, I came to see the cemetery. It’s been receiving Orthodox Serbs for about 90 years. The place is thick with weighty headstones.

With a mix of Cyrillic and Roman lettering.
There’s little funerary art, as seen in cemeteries steeped in Western European traditions, unless you count variations on the Cross. A few stones told in some detail of the person at rest, at least if you read Serbian.
Some sites included wooden crosses along with stone markers. A few had no headstone at all.

Some stones are of a distinctly modern cast, and in English.
I’ve read that Rod Blagojevich’s parents are in the cemetery, but I didn’t see their stone that I know of. Blago was recently in the news briefly for not being on President Obama’s commutation list during his last days in office. Tough luck, Rod. Politics ain’t beanbag.

Been There, Seen That

By Dees Stribling

Category Archives: Public Art