#alaac2023 in Chicago, part 2

 I took advantage of free time + being downtown.

Thursday afternoon:    Van Gogh and the Avant-Garde: the Modern Landscape is this summer's big show at the Art Institute.  I'd heard of Van Gogh and Seurat, of course, but I was not familiar with their contemporaries Signac, Bernard, and Angrand.

From the website:  

Between 1882 and 1890, five artists—Vincent van Gogh, along with Georges Seurat, Paul Signac,   Emile Bernard, and Charles Angrand—flocked to villages on the fringes of Paris. Unlike the earlier Impressionists, who in the previous decade had spent significant time in suburban locations further from the city, this next generation of ambitious artists preferred the northwestern suburbs around Asnières. This area along the Seine River had long been a popular spot for recreation and relaxation but was becoming increasingly populated with coal, gas, and manufacturing facilities in the last decades of the 19th century. And while its industrial development was an unappealing aspect to many, these artists found in the changing physical and social landscape a fresh and rich source of creativity.

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On Sunday morning I took a cab south of downtown -- from 2300 south (McCormick) to 7000 south (about 7 miles) to Bryn Mawr Community Church.  That's the church my parents belonged to when they lived in the city and where I was baptized in December, 1952, when I was six months old. (We moved to the northern suburbs a year after that so I do not recall this church at all.)  

I introduced myself and was warmly welcomed.   There were about 40 people in worship, including some kids (nice to see!).  It was Congregational then, United Church of Christ now.  They operate a food pantry and a counseling center among other ministries.

The church is beautiful.  Built in 1915, it needs constant maintenance.   They don't build 'em like this any more!                         I am SO happy that I did this.  

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Monday morning I went to the Museum of Science and Industry to see Pompeii: The Exhibition 

The emphasis was on everyday life in the city in 79 AD.  Several of the artifacts were "first time out of Italy."  There was a simulation (LOUD! with "smoke") of the volcanic blast.  

I also revisited some MSI favorites.  The Fairy Castle is still enchanting.  

I remember first seeing the "pickled babies" on a school field trip and announcing to my mother that now I knew how babies were made.   (The entire exhibit goes from conception to full term.)  Note the explanation about the fetuses.  

The math exhibit had some patchwork patterns.  I managed to negotiate the Mirror Maze without banging into any of the mirrors.  

Next post:  the quilts!  

"Day of Discovery" in Chicago

Last Thursday DH and I enjoyed a one-day Elderhostel program in Chicago. "The Devil in the White City Tour" was named for the book by Erik Larson that contrasted the glorious "White City" of the Columbian Exhibition of 1893, the economic boosterism and rivalries of the fair's planners (among them Daniel Burnham, Frederick Law Olmstead, and Mrs. Potter Palmer), and the sordid, horrific H. H. Holmes who ran a boardinghouse into which young women went, and did not return.

Our tour was coordinated by the Museum of Science and Industry, where the group (there were about 40) gathered. We saw a computer simulation of the fairgrounds, which included reclaimed shoreline and the broad strip called the Midway Plaisance. At the time the area was "suburban" -- Hyde Park was 7 miles south of the Loop. The fair was a "White City" because most of the buildings were constructed of "staff," a mixture of plaster and cement on burlap, painted white. None of the structures was intended to last for more than the six-month season of the fair. Much has been written about the fair itself, and you can look it up .

What interested me: how MSI can be an original fair building when everything was temporary. The answer: MSI, the Fine Arts building, had a masonry core and bronze fire doors to make it fireproof. Parts of the exterior were made of stone.....It operated as the Columbian Field Museum for 30 years, until the Stanley Field Museum of Natural History opened. Julius Rosenwald, the Sears & Roebuck magnate and Chicago philanthropist, gave $2m in cash and Sears stock to create a science museum. He did not want it named after him, partly to encourage others to give, and also because of anti-Semitism, though for a while it was called the Rosenwald Industrial Museum. It became the MSI in 1933. Generations of Chicago kids (myself among them) remember the submarine, the coal mine, the larger-than-life-sized heart, the "pickled babies" (fetal development)....but I digress.

Our MSI tour included a walk on the grounds. The photo here is of two of the 7-foot-tall karyatids, a classical architectural feature (and another memory from those childhood field trips).

We then got on a coach bus and headed north to Lawry's The Prime Rib restaurant. I've walked past it often en route to ALA headquarters, but had never gone inside. It's the Leander McCormick mansion, built in 1894, said to be haunted by Mrs. McC. It was a casino and speakeasy in the 30's; then Kungsholm marionnette opera theatre, and became Lawry's in 1976. Our lunch replicated the Great Midway Ball Luncheon of 1893, as described in Larson's book: hash, beef stew soup, chicken fricasees with mashed potatoes, and raspberry sorbet....imagine having such hearty fare routinely! It was delicious.

Joining us at lunch was a guide from the Chicago Architecture Foundation (http://www.architecture.org/)

He provided us with more information about fin de siecle Chicago. We took the bus to Prairie Avenue, where the wealthiest people in the city lived--the Fields, the Armours, and others. (http://www.cityofchicago.org/Landmarks/P/PrairieAveDistrict.html) With the recent redevelopment of the South Loop, Prairie Avenue is once again an attractive place to live. The Marshall Field, Jr., mansion has been divided into condominiums. Which one has the parlor in which Field died? That story is one of the tales in "Sin in the Second City," http://www.sininthesecondcity.com/, just blocks from Prairie Avenue (but not on our tour).

Finally, back to MSI for a walk to the Japanese Garden on Northerly Island in Jackson Park. It, too, is a remnant of the Fair. (http://www.hydepark.org/parks/osaka2.htm#history) Our group was large and it had already been a long day, so we couldn't really enjoy the serenity of the garden.

It was a most enjoyable way to spend a beautiful September day! This was our fifth EH "Day of Discovery" and we look forward to future Discoveries!