Chloe

Walking to the Brown Line Station each Sunday after visiting my mother, I walk by a back yard that has its long side open to the street behind a chain link fence.  Sometimes, in the green lawned spring or frigid snow of winter, I would see a small dog in that yard.  Unlike pretty much any other dog I've ever encountered, it would never bark.  Year after year, never.  Once or twice  she'd come closer to the fence when I said hello.  Sometimes she'd cast a quick glance at me from what I saw as sad eyes.  I wondered, not too deeply, about her life, and about the people who owned her, and whether her subdued presence spoke of a less than happy life.

And then a couple weeks ago I found on the fence what you see in the above photo.

There is so much cruelty in the world.  Behind every unknown door, down avoided streets, across the hidden half of the world, you feel cruelty lurking, the common currency supporting so many of the thoughtless pleasures of our comfortable everyday lives.  Cruelty, just beneath the surface, easily unseen.

I admit that is what I thought of, what I feared, when I saw the little dog alone in the yard.  And so, when I saw gentle Chloe's memorial, and the kind inscriptions from neighbors, I felt shame.  Even more, I felt a sadness.  A sadness for Chloe's passing, and for slighting the possibility that the answer to a mystery could still be love.

As James Turrell transforms Wright's Guggenheim, a look at his Chicago Skyspace

Well, here's another great show I'll never get to.

photo courtesy Guggenheim Museum, �David Heald

The Guggenheim Museum in New York has turned its iconic, Frank Lloyd Wright designed spaces over to James Turrell, and the artist has transformed them with spectacular installations of color and light.  The continuous ramp rotunda has become Aten Reign,  described by The New Yorker's Peter Schjeldahl as �six evenly spaced, concentric ovoid rings, smoothly clad in white plastic� which increase in size, from the rotunda's skylight almost down to the floor. �An orchestration of slowly shifting colored light, from unseen L.E.D. fixtures between the rings, suffuses the atmosphere with one ravishing playoff another another: breathable beauty.�

I really need to figure out a way to get away more, but since, for the moment, it's not possible, I have to settle for being put in mind of Chicago's own James Turrell work, Skyspace, which opened at Roosevelt and Halsted in 2006.  Turrell was on hand for the dedication, which we wrote about here.  It's a 43-foot-in diameter pavilion, with a 26-foot high ceiling pierced by a central oculus designed to create the illusion of �celestial vaulting - the illusion, when viewing the sky without a horizon line, that the sky is aligned with the plane of the ceiling.�

What makes Skyspace distinctive is how, try as it might, it's not an entirely controlled space.  The setting, a juncture of urban formation, keeps insinuating itself inside.

Next door to the west is the St. Francis of Assisi Church, dating from 1875.

The spiritual qualities inherent in Skyspace finds a counterpoint in the church rituals that spill over onto the Earl Neal plaza in which Skyspace is placed.  

Skyspace finds itself mediating between a working class neighborhood that has been largely effaced, and the great urban machine that has superseded it, the relentlessly expanding presence of the University of Illinois's Chicago campus.

More next weekend.

James Turrell runs at the Guggenheim Museum, New York, through September 25. 

Read:

A James Turrell Skyspace Comes to a Very Different Maxwell Street

Study in Black and Red and Daley Plaza: Stanley Cup Celebration Day

click imae for larger view

what is this?

see a photoessay across downtown and across the day, after the break . . .




and a few more from Daley Plaza . . .

 . . .  and the best view at Daley Plaza . . .

II.  After the Party:

Noguchi in a plastic bag

this woman asked if I wanted to take their picture. I thought she meant with her camera.  But she didn't.

 

 

 Stan Mikita jersey; Frank Gehry reception desk

James and Mary: Two Contrasting, Cautionary Tales of the Spirit of the City

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Birth, growth, decline, death, purgatory, resurrection - or not.  Two very similar stories; two very different outcomes.

Even as the Chicago Archdiocese is about to set the bulldozers loose to destroy the even more historic 1880's St. James Church at 2942 South Wabash, the story of St. Mary of the Angels Church illustrates that with a more enlightened leadership, it doesn't have to be that way.  Friends of Historic St. James Church, the hardy band of parishioners and preservationists who mounted a spirited campaign to save St. James, appear to have lost out to Francis Cardinal George's determination to destroy the building, despite offers of a million dollars of in-kind services to save it.

Like St. James, St. Mary of the Angels had a history worth saving.  The parish was originally created to ease overcrowding at nearby St. Stanislaus Koska.  Two city blocks - 86 lots - were acquired for $60,000.  One was reserved for the church, the other subdivided for housing. In 1899, a small combined church and school opened, designed by noted ecclesiastical architect Henry Schlacks.

The congregation continued its rapid growth, and by 1909, St. Mary's first pastor, Rev. Francis Gordon began thinking about a larger church.  Designed by Worthmann and Steinbach, it was modeled after St. Peter's in Rome, and its Baroque elegance sought to recall Poland's Golden Age, before it was wiped off the map as a nation, partitioned and occupied by three European powers.

Work began on September 28, 1911, but the outbreak of World I and resulting materials shortages delayed construction.  The resolve remained.  According to Denis Robert McNamara's book Heavenly City: The Architectural Tradition of Catholic Chicago, the new church was intended as a testament to �a belief in the Resurrection of Christ and the firm conviction that Poland would be restored.�  And they were rewarded.  By the time St. Mary of the Angels was finally dedicated in 1920, the victorious allies had again made Poland, for the first time in centuries, a sovereign nation.

And then the  construction of the Kennedy Expressway replayed the issue of partition by slicing up the community and destroying many parishioner' homes.  When the superhighway opened in 1960, it became the conduit drawing many residents out of the city and away from the now mutilated fabric of their abandoned neighborhood.  From a high of 1,600 families and 1,200 students, the parish declined, until it was closed in 1988, citing  - sound familiar? - dwindling membership and prohibitive repair costs as mandating the building's demolition.  As has been the case at St. James, the announcement evoked an uproar, and an energetic campaign to reverse St. Mary of the Angels' death warrant.

It must have been a gentler time.  The Archdiocese's real estate operation was, always, indifferent, but it would be made to yield when those struggling to save the church found an ally in Joseph Cardinal Bernadin, who requested the Prelature of Opus Dei to assume responsibility for the historic building, which they did in 1991, beginning an extensive restoration, first with the dome, and then, in 1997, with the interior.

A Save the Dome campaign placed signs on that dome making its website url visible throughout the community. The cost of the repairs was estimated at $3.2 million, with $900,000 listed as raised.  This has evolved into a Restore God's House Campaign.  In addition to dome repair and renovating the south tower, it includes rebuilding the east parapet wall, which was dismantled for safety reasons in 1991, the elements all carefully put into storage.

The church gets its name from the 26 angels placed along the exterior.  My understanding is that these are not the originals, and the fact that they all seem to be identical gives the composition a certain Dolly-like quality that's not entirely reassuring.

While certain economies were taken in the execution of the exterior, there's still the grand entryway on Hermitage . . .

and well as cherubs . . .

and terra cotta ornament . . .

culminating in the papal coat-of-arms . . .

The true glory of St. Mary of the Angels is its interior, including elaborate decoration added by artist John A. Mallin in the 1940's.

� 2009, Jeremy Atherton, Wikipedia Creative Commons

 The sanctuary has just been documented in a stunning set of photographs by Chris Smith on the Out of Chicago website.  And now I know the trick to getting those photographs with the great vantage points.  Help change the light bulbs.

Or at least that's what worked for Smith.  What he intended as a pop-in shoot wound of being an all-day event.  After helping out changing the bulbs in the chandeliers 30 feet above the floor, he got access to the balcony - and then everyone went out for Chinese buffet.  Check out Chris Smith's great photo portrait of the sanctuary here.

While nothing is ever certain in our increasingly secular world, St. Mary's of the Angels now seems to have a future.  Attendance at services has grown.  The nuns are long gone from the Sisters of the Resurrection convent constructed across from the church in 1905 . . .

. . .  but they've now been replaced by the young professionals who continue to gentrify the Bucktown neighborhood - the building was recently been redeveloped as condos.

 You see the same thing happening on the Near South Side.  I was impressed walking down to Second Presbyterian Church  last week how the stretch of Michigan down to 19th street now seemed an almost continuous procession of loft conversions, new residential towers, bars, trendy restaurants and all the other accoutrement's of an economically revived neighborhood.

Continuing north, just south of St. James, at 2942 South Wabash, you can see similar signs of change in the Motor Row district on Michigan that the city is intent on making a major music and arts district that will draw in both Chicago residents and all those conventioneers looking for something to do while lodged in one of the thousands of new hotel rooms McPier is constructing off of Cermak Road.

The Archdiocese, of course, can't see it.  On Wednesday, lest anyone doubt its determination - and power - it punched a huge hole in the roof of St. James, and then, statement made, sent the wrecking crews home.  According to a report in the Trib by Ron Grossman, its spokesman declined to say when demolition would resume.

St. James interior, photograph courtesy David Schalliol

For the Chicago archdiocese, gazing into eternity - no problem.  Looking a few decades down the road, not so much.  If the Archdiocese had had their way, St. Gelasius and Holy Family would today be little more than parking lots and memories.  The announcement of their impending demolition, as at St. James, also evoked outrage and activism, but a more receptive Archdiocese listened, and agreed to alternatives that have made churches anchors of revival in their communities.  

St. Gelasius

Because the Archdiocese declined to demolish Old St. Patrick's when it was down to serving a mere handful of families, today it's a thriving center of the booming West Loop.  This weekend, Old St. Pat's will welcome 18,000 people to it's annual �World's Largest Block Party� fundraiser.  [The first 500 people to arrive in Chicago Blackhawks wear will get an additional drink ticket - now, there's a church even an agnostic can love.)

The Archdiocese would have you believe that the spirit of devotion generations of immigrants built with their sacrifices into the beautiful churches that expressed their faith vanishes from the building the moment it's deemed a real estate problem.  Yet that spirit remains infused in the structure.  It has not vanished; it is deliberately destroyed and discarded as a matter of choice.

When a city destroys its architectural heritage, it consumes itself, and denatures its future.

Read More:

Will 130 years of history and faith be destroyed?  Friends of Historic St. James rally to forestall wrecking ball.

Parishioners, Preservationists hold Vigil to Save St. James Church as Developer offers to do Rehab for the $5 million Archdiocese has earmarked for new church.

Heavens to Purgatory: Imploding Churches Flatten Chicago

Chicago Jewel Unhidden: Inside Howard van Doren Shaw's spectacular Second Presbyterian Church, now a Historic Landmark

Where if Not Us? - Participatory Design and Its Radical Approaches opens at the Graham with reception and discussion - more for June

I'm pretty sure these will be the last additions for June Calendar of Chicago Architecture Events, but the Graham Foundation is opening a new exhibition, Where if Not Us? - Participatory Design and its Radical Approaches, with a reception this Thursday the 27th,  and a public discussion Participatory Design and its Radical Approaches, on Friday with Mathias Heyden and Ines Schaber, as well as Roberta Feldman, Landon Bone Baker Architects and Henry Sanoff.


Thursday is one of those log-jam days, with a special Chicago Commission Landmarks rubber stamp session on Wrigley Field in the morning, and in the evening, in addition to the reception at the Graham, the opening the Illinois State Preservation Conference, an AIA/Chicago tour of the Joyce Foundation's new offices, The Green Office Challenge at the Center for Green Technology, Marshall Brown and Geof Oppenheimer discussing Architecture, Power and the Urban Imaginary; a signing and reception for the new book Evanston: 150 Years, 150 Places, and Carolyn Armenta Davis discussing The Art of Architecture: Today's African-American, Afro-European and African Architects at the Woodson Regional Library.


Even with only 5 days left, there are still well over dozen great items still to check out on the June Calendar of Chicago Architecture Events.

Infinite Curve: Vi�oly's Chapel at the U of C Center for Care and Discovery

When we wrote about the new Logan Center for the Performing Arts at the University of Chicago at the time of its opening last fall, we included this view towards of Rafael Vi�oly's Center for Care and Discovery, the $700 million, 240 bed hospital whose massive bulk looming over the U of C campus we described as looking �like a beached ocean liner�.

click images for larger view

In Vi�oly's defense, he was working with the University's program, which stressed the kind of supply-chain empire-building that is a dominant force of our time in general and in health care in particular.  As I learned from a generous and informative tour from Vi�oly Architects Project Manager Joe Cliggott earlier this month, Vi�oly's exterior design incorporatea a number of features to break up the monolithic quality, as well as a highly creative approach to making the hospital experience more - well, hospitable - for care givers, patients, and visitors alike.  I hope to cover these in more detail in a later post. (And also the new Carol Ross Barney daycare center you can glimpse in the bottom right of the photo below.)

While during my tour I learned any number of things that impressed me, today I want to take a look at the one feature that surprised me, and in a very positive way.  It's the chapel on the seventh floor �Garden�, the sky lobby encompassing waiting and support rooms for visitors, which are not only gracious, but provide some of the most spectacular views in Chicago.

The chapel is a counterpoint to so much of the rest the design.  In the larger design, the right angle, save for rounded columns, predominates, relentlessly.  In contrast, in the chapel, the right angle is banished, even in its expression on the exterior of the building.

The wall facing the lobby curves.  The entrance door is not immediately apparent.  You look at the wall and place your bets, but you know immediately when you find it, by the feel on your hand of the thin, hidden strip of metal near the edge, whose cool, smooth texture is a shock to the touch compared to the texture and temperature of the otherwise omnipresent wood.  The cherry wood veneer is in striking contrast to the celebration of metal, glass, and applied color in the rest of the hospital.

Once you enter the chapel and close the door behind you, you are in interfaith room completely unmarked by any religious imagery.  The objects - whether they be sacred or seating - required by individual religions are stored behind another hidden door in a small closet that bumps into the room as if stretching the unbroken banding of wood.  Above that wood, a band of white wall and a narrow continuous strip of clerestory windows wraps around the top of the room.

There are no right angles in this room.  If you can imagine away the rude but code-required Exit sign, it's as if you find yourself in  a space where you don't how you got there, or how you'll get out.  The acoustic seal creates one of those places where you actually �hear� the silence.  Occasional sounds from the lobby filter in, muffled and distant, as if you're hearing them underwater.  Although the placement of the closet �bump� subtly demarcates a visual focus towards the �alter� area, the chapel, ultimately, is an ever continuous space.  No beginning.  No end.  It just �is�.  A sanctuary, filled from above with celestial light.  A glimpse of eternity, claustrophobic, until you give yourself over to its serenity.

In alternating succession, the experience of Vi�oly's chapel can be both unsettling and comforting.  I like this space.

Read Also:

Rafael Vi�oly talks Wright, new hospital, at the Logan Center for the Arts