St. Louis & the City Museum

Industrial landscape along the red line lightrail route, headed towards downtown. Lots of pipes along this building!

Since the pandemic began over two years ago, my traveling has been limited. The vast majority of my time has been spent around Chicagoland, and the rare trip has been done via car and only for a long weekend at a time. With more folks returning to some semblance of pre-pandemic life, I have at least one scheduled cross-country flight for this summer for a wedding. As enjoyable as this trip will be, I still feel anxiety about boarding a plane for the first time in several years, being in close proximity to others for several hours, and being away from home. As such, I planned a short sort of test run trip to make sure I could handle a longer flight and further venture. I opted to fly to St. Louis for a long weekend - at right around an hour, I figured this would give me a taste for the experience without needing to fully commit. We’d also never spent any time in St. Louis, so it was a good excuse to visit a new city.

Our first afternoon was spent wandering around the Arch and its surrounding public space. It was lovely to see the massive structure peeking through blooming trees.

The base of the arch, with stairs down to the visitor center and one of the many bridges across the Mississippi River in the background.

Though we only spent a couple of days, it was a lovely visit. The weather was warm and mostly sunny, a far cry from the rainy 40s and 50s we’d been experiencing in Chicago for what seemed like months. And it was great to explore and photograph, something I’d done far less of during the pandemic, but which feels so satisfying to me. The highlight of the trip for me was a day spent at the City Museum in downtown St. Louis:

“Housed in the 10-story, 600,000 square-foot warehouse of the International Shoe Company, City Museum is a mixture of children’s playground, funhouse, surrealistic pavilion, and architectural marvel made out of found and repurposed objects. The brainchild of internationally-acclaimed artists Bob and Gail Cassilly, both classically trained sculptors, City Museum opened for visitors in 1997.”

The first space we walked into in the City Museum was full of sea creatures built out of concrete, mosaic, tunnels, and plants.

We then started up the stairs and realized the handrail rungs were made out of an old conveyor system, painted in bright colors.

Slides repurposed from the original merchandise chutes.

The space is absolutely incredible, and I feel like I could have spent the entire weekend there. The 10-story slides repurposed from the original merchandise chutes in particular were mesmerizing. I took many photographs as we walked from space to space, and it happily felt a bit like years past of finding a cool spot and experiencing it through photography. It was heartwarming to see such a broad cross section of the public enjoying the massive space. I’ll definitely be back, as they’re continually modifying and expanding the experience.

Model train, children’s train ride, and pinball area flanked by giant metal insect sculptures.

The rooftop featured a ferris wheel and beautiful views of the St. Louis skyline.

The roof also had several slides, more rebar tunnels to climb through, and a school bus balanced on the edge of the building.

We ended our visit wandering around the massive exterior structure along the old warehouse, which featured two aircraft resting on old cranes and a maze of metal tunnels many kids and some brave adults were climbing through.

It felt strange to be away from home, to be around strangers, to not always be masked up. I still have mixed feelings about how we’re moving forward. At the same time, it was nice to make some space for new experiences and wandering around a new city. 

Enjoying the sunshine, emerging leaves on the trees, and an old deco storefront in downtown St. Louis.

Wandering through Forest Park and stopping to take in the World’s Fair Pavilion on the way to the lightrail.

Stopping by the St. Louis Art Museum to admire the new wing that my partner helped to engineer.

Saying goodbye for now to St. Louis from the Forest Park lightrail station.

Chicago Architecture Biennial 2021

Through all the changes and turmoil of the second half of 2021, the most recent edition of the Chicago Architecture Biennial was on my radar, but other pressures kept me from checking it out. I finally carved out some time to visit the indoor exhibition space the weekend it was set to close. Though I didn’t get a chance to explore the installations throughout the city, I’m glad I got a glimpse into what this year’s biennial was all about:

“The concept and title for the 2021 edition, The Available City, asks us to consider the impact collective space can have in cities today. Through a reinvented and responsive global platform, the Biennial will create opportunities for conversations about the intersection of architecture and design and such critical issues as health, sustainability, equity, and racial justice leading up to and throughout the run of the edition.”

A view of the work ‘Up from the Past: Housing as Reparations on Chicago’s South Side’ by Isabel Strauss. Naturally, I was really drawn to this presentation of archival research.

A detail of photographs from ‘Up from the Past.’

The connection between space, especially architecture, and the well-being of the community that inhabits it has always interested me. Working and volunteering at the National Public Housing Museum cemented the reality that housing is a human right. Our recent experience buying a 2-flat with our friends further revealed just how unfair and restrictive it can be securing stable housing. Exhibits in the biennial seemed to take these ideas as a baseline and expand further - into the creativity of ways in which people make their dwellings their homes, of ways in which communities collectively adapt spaces to meet their needs, of the possibilities of fostering greater connection across spaces between seemingly unlike communities. 

The installation ‘Miracles, Now’ by Departamento del Districto (Mexico City) analyzed the changing urban landscape of the city.

Detail view of ‘Miracles, Now’

Another detail view of ‘Miracles, Now’

I was absorbed by this non-narrated film ‘Communities at Work’ by Christophe Hutin Architecture (Bordeaux). It was fascinating watching how different communities make their spaces home.

In short, the works I saw felt more hopeful around the state of spaces, in spite of everything. It’s not that the status quo is acceptable, but rather works in the exhibit offered glimmers of what could be different, what could better serve the people and community that inhabit different spaces. I walked away from the biennial thinking about how individuals and groups are the most knowledgeable about how their spaces should be used, and reflecting on when, where, and why community is taken into account and allowed to lead development processes. I’m looking forward to the next biennial, and hopefully by that time, external circumstances will allow for me to explore it more in-depth.

The installation ‘Microprocesses: A Choreography of Urban Integration’ by Enlace Arquitectura + Ciudad Laboratorio (Caracas) looked at the divisions that occur in cities and how these artificial barriers can be broken down.

Another view of ‘Microprocesses: A Choreography of Urban Integration’

The final room of the exhibit in the Graham Foundation.

The installation ‘The Opportunity of Scarcity’ by El Cielo (Mexico City) invited visitors to imagine the urban landscape of Mexico City.

One view of a long scroll painting, entitled ‘Still Life in the Windy City’ by Drawing Architecture Studio (Beijing), that I absolutely loved. So many details and vignettes from around Chicago in one work.

Quincy, Illinois

This fall, I took one of the few trips I’ve been on since the pandemic started. We drove out to Quincy Illinois, which is located on the western border of the state along the Mississippi River. Our visit only lasted for a long weekend, and it felt strange to not be in Chicago, but it was nice to have a change of scenery. I was particularly interested in the architecture, especially the industrial area next to the river. It was a good excuse to get my camera out and do a little exploring.

This modernist bank was what prompted me to get out my camera for the first time during the trip.

The next few images are more from the bank. Because yeah, I really liked this building

Who knew that the entrance to parking could actually look interesting?

The mirrored glass made for lovely effects with the lines of the building itself.

Some adaptive reuse for these historic brick buildings, which were likely warehouses in their previous lives.

This taller building looked like it must have had joining tall neighbors which were demolished at some point.

The sun was very intense as we were walking around, and I was really into the white of these satellite dishes against the blue sky.

Historic theater downtown, all the tile work was beautiful.

Next to the theater, a line of multistory brick buildings. It was hard to tell if these were being used and/or occupied.

Walking towards the river as the afternoon progressed, with more industrial and warehouse views.

Old signage, including one neon sign, with taller brick buildings.

There’s a steep hill down to the river, and from the top you get nice views of the industrial buildings and bridges.

Looking up at yet another brick building with some interesting embellishments and partially obscured old painted advertisement or sign.

I enjoyed all the various levels of constructed landscape - lots of buildings on varying grades, and of course, lots of brick.

The newer of a few bridges running across the Mississippi. This little park at the base of the bridge was a pleasant stop for a break.

Silhouetted rail bridge and power lines.

A non-silhouetted view of the train tracks over the bridge, from the perspective of a grade-level set of train tracks.

And finally, some kind of electrical substation along the river, as seen through a chainlink fence.

Open House Chicago 2021

October in Chicago means Open House Chicago, and this year was no exception. After 2020 only featuring sites visitors could view from the exterior, 2021 allowed a return to touring inside buildings across the city and near suburbs. Being fully vaccinated and missing exploring my city, I went out to see a handful of sites in spite of my anxiety about being around strangers for the first time since the pandemic began. I certainly didn’t regret it! We stopped at sites in Logan Square, Wicker Park, Fulton Market, and Back of the Yards, and the current functions of these buildings ranged from comedy clubs to schools to green business incubators. It felt good to get out, enjoy the city, and take some photographs.

Bar at the Lincoln Lodge in Logan Square.

Performance space in the Lincoln Lodge, Logan Square.

Exterior of Josephinum Academy of the Sacred Heart, Wicker Park.

Library in Josephinum Academy of the Sacred Heart, Wicker Park.

Interior of the Herman Miller Showroom in Fulton Market.

Framed work and wallpaper on a wall of the Herman Miller Showroom in Fulton Market

Interior break room space in the Plant, Back of the Yards.

Packinghouse Museum in the Plant, Back of the Yards.

Interior detail of plants in the Plant, Back of the Yards.

Plants and shelving inside Plant Chicago in Back of the Yards.

Interior detail of the ceiling in the Plant Chicago, Back of the Yards.

Returning to work after being furloughed

April 1st I came back to work from furlough, and mid-April was my first trip back onsite since the November prior. I made monthly visits for the rest of the spring to fulfill reference requests. It felt strange returning - I was thankful to have a paycheck from the museum again, it was great to virtually meet with colleagues again, and the physical archive itself is a comfort in its own (relatively) unchanging, indifferent way. But it’s challenging not to feel some anger and frustration for everyone who was furloughed and those who weren’t furloughed but bore the brunt of increased workloads. And the negative feelings extend to how workers at the museum and beyond have been treated in capitalist societies. Many actions taken - layoffs, workers being forced to come onsite often without necessary protective equipment while the pandemic raged, pay cuts, furloughs - were described as inevitabilities when in reality these were choices made by those with power. In many cases, though the resulting economic downturn from the pandemic has been blamed as the catalyst for these actions, there is sufficient money available. Wealth and power is further consolidated during wide scale emergencies like this one. 

A visual representation in the form of many notations on a catalog card of all the workers who have worked with this archive.

Routine work - finding and digitizing large format negatives like this one - does provide some grounding after months of instability.

It seems reasonable that those who survived the last year would move on from this experience with a different understanding of the way the world works, and how unnecessarily fraught of existences so many live. I sincerely hope that collectively, we don’t attempt to return to “business as usual.” We need better safety nets for people, and folks shouldn’t have to work in order to sustain themselves. It remains to be seen what, if anything, we carry with us moving forward. Seeing downtown emerging from winter, green replacing gray, and blossoms emerging is a reminder that time marches on. What we make of our time is up to us.

A view of Grant Park and the skyline, Chicago.

Maggie Daley Park with skyscrapers in the background, Chicago.

Lilacs blooming outside of the museum, Chicago.

A moment of peace in the north gardens of the museum on a sunny day.

Photography experiments

During my furlough, I spent some time with my camera. I didn’t make much time for photography in previous years as a result of school, so this seemed like a good opportunity to get back into the saddle. And, unlike what few photography sessions I made time for in the recent past, I attempted to do so without exploring a new environment. Architectural, landscape, and place-based photography is my bread and butter, so I decided to switch things up. I worked with macro photography and some different prism materials to create compositions around our apartment. The change of pace was nice - it was a release to experiment, release, and not put so much pressure on myself to make “good” pictures. I hope I can continue this practice more regularly moving forward, since it reminded me why I fell in love with photography to begin with.

Looking through a colorful prism out my office door to the building across the street.

Detail of small rainbows produced from one of my prisms in my office window.

A rare self-portrait, taken with a colorful prism distorting my face.

View out one of our living room windows to the street, photographed through a filter that produces rainbows in the light.

My hand basking in one of the many rainbows that now travel through our living spaces in the afternoon.

Macro image of a rainbow bismuth crystal

The end of 2020, the beginning of 2021

Last month saw some major life changes, and some serious ups and downs. On one hand, my partner and I closed on and moved into a lovely 2-flat building with our close friends. Buying a home never felt like a possibility, but with the news that the apartment building we were collectively living in was being sold (which had happened in the previous building all of us lived in), we recognized there would be more stability in owning. Through the guidance of some very helpful professionals, we found our new home. It feels good to know we can put down some roots, continue to be neighbors with our pals, and it’s exciting to have the chance to get to know a new (to us) neighborhood. This opportunity still feels unreal, and I’m so thankful for it.

On the other hand, less than a week after our closing, I was informed that I would be furloughed from January until at least March, along with over 100 staff at the museum. The governor’s order to close all museums back in November was the justification used for this measure, along with several layoffs and pay cuts non-furloughed staff were forced to take. After 4 weeks of being furloughed, around 40 of us have been told that we will be furloughed until at least April, even though the museum has been given the green light to open. I am frustrated and sad for those departments that have been particularly hard hit - our education team, and the library and archives - given how committed these teams are to their work, their colleagues, and the communities they support. I’m also concerned about non-furloughed staff and the likelihood that they are taking on more work given their coworkers’ absences. Unsurprisingly, this is compounding on an already difficult time for so many, and one that’ll leave its mark for some time to come.

I suppose the closing lessons of 2020 and opening lessons of 2021 are those of the unpredictability of life and the need to find grounding regardless of what’s happening in the outside world. I still struggle to accept and embrace these realities, but it would seem I’ll have many more opportunities to practice and grow. 

Adventuring around Chicago - Summer 2020

For the last year or so, I had imagined that this summer would be one filled with celebration and travel since I completed grad school in May. The pandemic dramatically altered those plans. While it feels like a bit of a let down, I also recognize how incredibly fortunate I am these days: still employed, in good health, cohabitating with a wonderful partner and stress-relieving cat. I know this is not the case for many, and that reality is far, far worse than a lost summer of fun. So, I’m readjusting my expectations and am seeking opportunities for escape a little closer to home.

Our close friends live downstairs, and we’ve been part of the same pandemic bubble since day one. I’ve gone on a few outings with them, with my partner, and solo - masked and largely within state borders to protect ourselves and those around us. It’s pretty remarkable how much my perspective changed on my surroundings after spending 95% of my time in the same 1,000 square foot apartment, with only the occasional walk around the neighborhood or trip to the grocery store. What likely would have been fairly mundane trips now feel like so much more. This shift in perspective is welcome, and it’s an unexpected gift in the midst of so much pain and suffering. It’s a confusing mixture of feelings to hold at the same time. 

I also haven’t been taking as many photographs as I’d anticipated I might this year. The majority of the images I’ve taken have been around our apartment, unsurprisingly, but our trips have been one exception to that. Below are a few of those, a few tangible slices of life during this incredibly strange and difficult time.

A ride down to Bridgeport means stops to take photographs of the old factories and warehouses in the area

More Bridgeport sights

One last view from Bridgeport

A stop to admire the architecture in West Town after picking up coffee

Alley peeping around Winnemac

A solo stroll around Humboldt Park

A fitting mural at Empty Bottle

A beautiful day around Goose Island

It was strange going months without going downtown

Walking through Wicker Park after a trip to the dentist

Hospitals: terrifying before, even moreso now

Venturing into the suburbs

A rare indoor trip for specialty wood

Big Marsh on the south side of the city

More Big Marsh, excited to visit again soon to see changes in this work-in-progress park

Driving around the industrial far south side

More industrial sights, this time at Wolf Lake

Chicago Architecture Biennial 2019

The Chicago Architecture Biennial opened once again last fall, and ran through January of this year. The title of this third edition of the biennial was “... and other such stories.” The curatorial statement on the biennial’s website has this to say about the overarching theme:

“[it] is rooted in close readings of the spatial realities of its host city. Sitting at the crossroads of the Great Plains and the Great Lakes, Chicago has been shaped by planetary forces: colonial expansion, mass migration, extraction economies, and rapid industrialization. Thus, Chicago’s urbanism is inextricable from the flows of people, goods, and capital—and the concurrent exploitation of bodies, labor, and nature—that have contributed to its making. Today, despite the promise of economic development, Chicago, like many other established and emergent global metropolises, faces challenging urban conditions that require the reimagining of forms of exchange between human activity, technology, and the natural world. By extension, owing to its physical geography, Chicago is a singular context in which to address climate and ecological concerns shared by many postindustrial societies.”

How Together space for communal gatherings, talks, and other activities.

My work and school schedule made attending challenging, so I only had the chance to spend a few hours over the course of a couple of days. I’m glad I was able to attend regardless, because it was an amazing series of works that spanned a number of different topics in the field of architecture, urban planning, design, activism, and climate change. To see so much content relating to the tangible impact the built environment has on society was really refreshing. This wasn’t just a series of exhibits about the beauty of design, rather the curators made the choice to focus on pressing issues facing all of us today.

Exhibit on the intersection between sanity and equity across the globe

There were so many works that drew me in, but a few in particular really stuck out. The first was a series of plexiglass panels that could be found throughout the Chicago Cultural Center, the host building for the biennial. The project was called Decolonizing the Chicago Cultural Center. The American Indian Center worked together with the Settler Colonial City Project to develop a series of interventions throughout the building. The writing on each of the panels call out specific aspects of design and symbolism in the Cultural Center, and the “hidden stories of colonial violence embedded in the building and its materials, commemorative plaques, and ornaments.” It was grounding to consider these histories and how they show up in our built environment, especially since so many of us - largely those with some degree of privilege - don’t know about or haven’t been negatively impacted by these events.

Decolonizing the Chicago Cultural Center panel, this one discussing tributes to the Civil War built into the building

One space I really enjoyed was the Anarchitectural Library (against the neoliberal erasure of Chicago’s common spaces). A small library was set up, organized by subject, and complete with a small reading area. The project description: 

“Anarchitectural Library addresses the Chicago Cultural Center’s history as the city’s first public library, an institution conceived in part as a space to “civilize” an unruly population of immigrants, workers, socialists, and anarchists. Whereas the original library responded to the specific struggles of the late nineteenth century by pacifying political demands, Anarchitectural Library gives voice to contemporary organizations fighting to keep alive spaces that produce and maintain urban life and collectivity. The library houses printed publications submitted by Chicago-based activists, organizers, and researchers whose work resists public housing destruction, school closures, loss of industry, environmental degradation, and mass incarceration. The public is invited to peruse and discuss its contents.”

Wrapping up library school, an exhibit centered around information exchange and connection definitely resonated with me. But diving even deeper, the focus of topics in this collection speaks to the needs of so many in our city. It was wonderful seeing folks visiting the biennial browsing the selection of books and pamphlets, and engaging in conversation.

Anarchitectural Library

Two other works looked at the housing crisis in São Paulo and how a lack of affordable housing has impacted so many in the city. The work What does an ethical landlord look like? provides some useful contextual information about both the city and country. Stated boldly on one of the panels: “There are more vacant houses than people in need of a home - 6.3 million = Brazil’s housing deficit, 7.9 million = the number of vacant homes in Brazil.” Provided too are statistics about the money São Paulo spends on rental vouchers ($37 million annually) and the average time spent commuting to and from the city (4 hours). The work looks to collective actions as a way of addressing these issues. FICA is one such group, “a crowdfunded real estate fund created and managed by a nonprofit organization comprised of architects, designers, teachers, researchers, and activists… FICA’s goal is to guarantee permanent, affordable housing in São Paulo… by buying apartments in the city center, renting them at below-market rates to those in most need, and using the rental income and donated funds to acquire further apartments.” The work presented at the biennial is a replica of a five hundred square foot apartment, the first unit purchased by the group.

Panels from What does an ethical landlord look like?

An overall view of the floorplan

In the second installation on São Paulo, titled MTSC - Housing as Citizenship Practice, a series of videos, interviews, protest banners, booklets, and infographics show how some folks are pushing back in a more direct way. This work looks at the group MTSC in particular, and how the group has organized mass occupations of vacant properties to put pressure on the government to provide affordable, public housing while also providing shelter for individuals and families who need it. MTSC has used a variety of strategies to accomplish their goals, and it was fascinating to learn about what can be accomplished when people come together.

View of some of the many amazing elements to MTSC - Housing as Citizenship Practice

There was so much information packed into this exhibit

I left the biennial full of questions and ideas, and had some great conversations with friends about topics presented. I didn’t know quite what to expect of the theme of the biennial, but I certainly didn’t expect to leave feeling so engaged. I hope that future biennials will continue along this thread of engaging in immediate challenges we face.

Works looking at ownership, occupancy, and the need for new (not capitalist-based) systems for equitable housing

Works looking at architectural erasures in various societies and cities throughout the world

Works on exclusion and which advocate for a more inclusive future

The incredible and devastating Gun Violence Memorial Project

Works about landscapes of resistance, recovery, and resilience

Works evaluating the relationship between humans and our natural environment, and which show the need for new ways of cohabitating with the world around us

Open House Chicago 2019

This fall marked another fantastic Open House Chicago weekend. It has been challenging to plan and spend all weekend visiting sites in the last few years, due to grad school. Regardless, I had the chance to visit a number of sites with friends the day I was able to set aside for adventuring. We ended up biking around Garfield Park, the West Loop, Back of the Yards, Bronzeville, and made a pitstop in Chinatown for a snack. The variety of sites - their function, aesthetic, and age - made for an interesting blend, and it felt great to take some photographs for myself! I’m looking forward to next year and exploring more of this amazing city!

Great Lakes Yard was our first stop of the day

Next, we stopped at Revolution Workshop, which is neighbors with Great Lakes Yard

Lab on Lake is a beautiful industrial building turned church, nightclub, homeless shelter, and now event space.

The Hatchery is a purpose-built hub for food businesses

UE Hall features amazing murals that tell the story of unionization

Bubbly is a light-industrial small business incubator

IIT’s Kaplan Institute was our last stop

Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago - Takashi Murakami

Since I’ve moved to Chicago and have been working in and learning about museums, I usually don’t visit museums and see special exhibits in a casual way. I really enjoy critically assessing what institutions are doing, and I appreciate having the background knowledge I do when approaching these experiences. Sometimes it’s nice to give myself permission to just enjoy a trip to a museum, though. The Murakami exhibit up at MCA Chicago was a great opportunity to do this. I still read the labels, considered the layout and design choices, and spent a good bit of time talking over the exhibit with my partner. At the end of the day, I approached this visit differently, and it was a nice break and an excellent visit.

Block Museum & National Museum of Mexican Art - Relevancy in Museums

I’ve had the chance to check out two art exhibits that have made me reflect on the idea of museums reacting to current events. There has been a steady debate for years about these institutions being relevant, about the role neutrality should play when curating exhibits and developing programs, or if neutrality is even possible. I think the idea of remaining neutral is itself taking a stance. While the subject of certain museums lend themselves to certain issues, I do think it is possible and even advisable for cultural heritage institutions to respond to what’s happening in the world more directly.

While on Northwestern’s campus, I visited the Block Museum of Art, and I spent the majority of my time in the exhibition If You Remember, I’ll Remember. From the website for the show, it is an: “invitation to reflect on the past while contemplating the present through works of art exploring themes of love, mourning, war, relocation, internment, resistance, and civil rights in 19th and 20th century North America… by engaging with historic documents, photographs, sound recordings, oral histories and objects of material culture drawn from institutional and informal archives, these artists highlight individuals’ stories or make connections to the their own histories… some make explicit links to events across time periods, while in others these associations are implicit.” The anniversaries of Executive Order 9066 and the Supreme Court’s decision in the Loving vs. Virginia case are both reflected in artwork in this show, as are other human rights issues, many of which we are still struggling with today. I appreciated the fact that the artwork featured so much primary source material, and was moved by the stories the artists helped to tell.

I also visited the National Museum of Mexican Art for the opening of Memoria Presente: An Artistic Journey. This exhibition is a celebration of the museum’s 30th anniversary, and it features artists working in a variety of media addressing a wide range of topics and issues. From the website for the show: “Since opening its doors in 1987, the Museum has showcased 220 exhibitions that exemplify a broad spectrum of artistic expressions from both sides of the Mexico-U.S. border.. the contemporary artists now creating artwork across our Midwest city continue to accurately reflect the vibrancy and diversity found within the Chicago-Mexican community… their poetic and political expressions carry on an extensive history of contemplative work and civic dialog in North America… the Museum’s philosophy of a Mexican culture “sin fronteras” (without borders) promotes art as a bridge between communities, while art education expands minds and breaks down barriers, even as it preserves cultural heritage.” The artwork on display tackled trans identity and acceptance in the community, violence in both Mexico and the United States, and mass incarceration.

In both shows, curators provided a platform for what many would deem to be inherently political work. In fact, the work was broadly about basic human rights, and the ongoing struggles that many communities face. Direct connections were made to current topics, so these shows weren’t just reflections of the past. I appreciated this about the shows, and I found the artwork to be engaging and refreshing. I hope that more museums work to incorporate issues we’re currently facing, it helps to provide connections and integrate these institutions.

Both exhibits are up through the summer, and I’d highly recommend a trip to see both.

From If You Remember, I’ll Remember

From Memoria Presente: An Artistic Journey

Tenement Museum

I recently traveled to New York City, and I finally visited the Tenement Museum while there. This museum has been on my list to see for several years, especially since the National Public Housing Museum wants to follow a similar model of recreating apartments once their space is fully renovated. I opted to go on two of their tours, and I’m glad I did.

The living spaces above the ground-floor businesses originally shuttered due to code updates the landlord could not and did not want to fulfill. This means that the majority of the building was a time-capsule, abandoned for decades. This also means that basic updates had to be completed to open the space for tours, and there are still restrictions on how visitors see the space. There is no free roaming, and tours are limited to an hour. While I understand the practical limitations to the space, I still found myself frustrated by this highly-controlled experience. I like to take my time and absorb at my own rate.

Information was also repeated from one tour to another, particularly in the entry hallway, perhaps with the assumption that visitors usually only opt to take one tour at a time. This normally would not bother me, but with limited time, it felt like lost time.

On the whole, I did thoroughly enjoy my experience at the museum, though. I appreciate the fact that they retained the majority of surfaces as they found them when the building was first reopened. “Abandoned” apartments are showcased on each floor, so that visitors can get a sense of the scale of these rooms and the urban archaeology involved in a space like this one. In some rooms, they have uncovered over 40 layers of paint, and looking down revealed decades of changing flooring, from wood to linoleum.

The recreated apartments were also effective. Each was meant to replicate the experience of specific families that lived in the building. The objects in these spaces were collected from thrift stores, estate sales, flea markets and many other venues not usually used to fill a museum spaces. As such, they aren’t traditional collections materials, that individually tell a story. It is only collectively that they recreate the stories of the families who lived and the times in which they lived. It did feel a bit like stepping back in time, and it was done tastefully.

I had a great deal of questions after visiting - what their conservation efforts looked like while making the space visitable, what current conservation challenges they face with the space, how collections materials (from what I gathered, primarily objects recovered on the site) are handled and tracked differently than apartment objects, etc etc. I hope to be able to ask these questions to staff one day, and I also hope to be able to return once their new apartments open this summer. These feature more contemporary families, which will more closely align in time period with families NPHM will likely feature.

Field Museum of Natural History - Restoring Earth

A group of friends and I visited the Field Museum together - it was a nice departure from our normal social activities. I tend to be a thorough, methodical museum visitor, but it’s a nice change of pace to approach these spaces more casually. I also really enjoy sharing the experience with others, it’s fun to share odd discoveries and find the most unusual-looking creature together.

A friend who previously worked at the museum encouraged the group to visit one of their newest exhibitions, which focuses on the conservation work the institutions’ scientists are actively doing: Abbott Hall of Conservation Restoring Earth. While I love the traditional dioramas, this exhibit felt much more contemporary, and the design itself matched the important work teams are doing from in landscapes from Peru to Cuba to Chicago. I was impressed in particular by a video showing off the collections storage, and how these materials contribute to our understanding of ecosystems and cultures across the globe. I welcome this direct approach museums can take to connect visitors to the institution itself and its connection to the outside world.

Museum of Contemporary Art - Mastry

I feel incredibly fortunate to have had the chance to see Kerry James Marshall’s survey Mastry at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. His work is incredible, and seeing so many pieces together, telling the diverse stories of African Americans in this country was moving. I was encouraged, too, to see a wide variety of individuals visiting the exhibit: young and old, all races and ethnicities. Too often I only see a specific type visiting museums; this exhibit should teach museums a lesson to make their spaces more inclusive by including more voices in what is presented. There was a nod to this in the introductory wall panel:

“For the past thirty-six years, Kerry James Marshall has been driven by a mission to address the absence of black artists and subjects in the history of art. Like many African Americans born during the civil rights movement, Marshall’s worldview and artistic practice have been shaped by questions of racial representation. He has committed to filling the walls of museums with black figures, depicting black people almost exclusively and telling stories about black lives and history on a grand scale.

To compete with the great artists from past centuries while expanding the possibilities of representation, Marshall has methodically mastered a wide range of techniques and remixed almost every tradition of painting from the past 500 years. He takes on many of the genres of art - including history painting, landscape, portraiture, and abstraction - carrying the tradition of painting into the present. To do this, he incorporates references to history, pop culture, contemporary life, and his hometown Chicago. He also reenvisions how African Americans are depicted, mixing black pigments to create his own set of tones for the skin and features of his subjects. In his richly detailed paintings - complex, beautiful, and relevant to the challenges of our time - it pays to look, look closely, and look again.”

The show is now traveling, I hope many more have a chance to connect with Marshall’s work.

Chicago Architecture Foundation - Open House 2016

Another great year of visiting interesting sites! This year we covered locations from Back of the Yards, the Loop, and UIC. These are a few phone shots, proper photos will be posted on my site soon. 

Union Station

Maybe less scenic part of the station

Palmer Printing

River City

Growing Power Iron Street Farm

Testa Produce

UIC's brutalist campus

Fine Arts Building

Roosevelt University Auditorium Building

Berlin's German Museum of Technology

We also visited the German Museum of Technology in Berlin. Industry, infrastructure, and transportation turned out to be the inadvertent theme of our trip. There was limited text in English, so I decided to enjoy the photographic opportunities in the space. These are a few shots I took with my phone, many more were taken with my DSLR.

Berlin's DDR Museum

Another museum we visited on our trip was the DDR Museum in Berlin. It opened in 2006, and it is rare (in Germany) in that it’s a privately-funded institution. It is a popular destination in the city, and that certainly proved to be the case when we visited. It was difficult to see everything, due in part to the crowding, the relatively small space of the exhibits, and the design of the exhibits themselves.

The primary exhibition spaces, which covered everything from travel throughout Eastern Bloc countries to required military service, relied on cabinets which you had to open to see objects and read about them. Drawers and shelves which could be opened had handles, but even with this visual clue, many skipped them opting to see what few displays were out in the open. Given how limited an area one had to be in to see the opened cabinets, it was a crowded, rushed experience that didn’t seem to connect much with the content itself. There were many in-depth interactives, as well, including “dressing” a dissident and running a factory under the limitations of the DDR. I only had the opportunity to try one of these, but it was an interesting way of engaging with this history.

The recreation of the apartment made more sense to have information presented in this way. Visitors could open kitchen cabinets and drawers under bunk beds to learn more about particular aspects of day-to-day life in East Berlin. Statistics were printed on appliances, and there was a CG timelapse of views outside the windows of the apartment, showing what the neighborhood looked like.

The tone of the labels was biased, sometimes sarcastic. This is interesting given how recently all of this occurred, and how most museums attempt to stay as neutral as possible (sometimes to their detriment). Perhaps this can be attributed to its private funding.

I would be curious to know how this museum is perceived by visitors, both those who experienced life in the DDR and outsiders. I walked away from the experience intrigued by the bias, but somewhat frustrated by the limitations in what I could see.

General exhibition case design, objects presented without having to open cabinets

Opening a drawer in the general exhibition

Crowded theater space

Kitchen in the apartment

Kitchen cabinet

Living room

Living room with time lapse window scene

Children's bedroom desk with opened cabinets

Port Museums of Hamburg

We just came back from a trip overseas, and we visited several museums along the way. Two of these sites included the Maritime Museum and the Harbor Museum in Hamburg. When I first learned about both, I was curious as to the similarities between the two, and there turned out to be many striking differences.

We visited the Maritime Museum first. It is surrounded by (and is housed in) large red brick warehouses recognized by Unesco as a World Heritage Site, which complements the comprehensive information the museum presents about all things shipping. It opened in 2008, and the overall design and flow of the exhibits is reflected in its recent inception. Much of the original structure was maintained while renovating the space for the museum, and the rustic columns and beams work nicely with the sleek glass cases and minimalist design used for the collections. The design of the space works well to highlight the objects. There are ten stories to visit, though we didn’t make it to all, and it would be easy to spend an entire day admiring the many amazing ship models, uniforms, buoys, and machines. I learned a lot about the history of shipping through this museum, which was a nice foundation for our visit to the Harbor Museum.

Historic warehouse district

General exhibition design in the historic spac

Contemporary models on display

Parts of ships, mechanical engineering behind the vessels

Historic models with supporting collections materials

The Harbor Museum is located is the harbor proper - across the Elbe from the city center and nestled into working spaces of the busy port. We ventured over by means of bikes, which was a great way of seeing more of the impressive infrastructure surrounding this museum. This site is also located in a former warehouse, but the presentation is much different than that of the Maritime Museum. 

Wandering inside, there are large industrial shelves filled with collections materials, some with labels explaining the contents. Scattered throughout, there are basic boxes with lights and plexi covers which hold groups of objects and labels. It feels more like storage than a traditional museum space, which is not necessarily a bad thing. Though the lack of climate control and protection seemed to cause stress to some of the materials, the space seemed much more lively than the Maritime Museum. There were individuals displaying their own model ships, and children and adults were “racing” model ships outside the main entrance. 

Outside, we wandered through their oversized industrial collections - cranes, railroad cars, and ships floating in the port. I was struck by how much freedom we were given; in the United States, we’d have to sign waivers and be supervised. It wasn’t always clear what was part of the museum and what was actually still in use - there was a basic map but no signs to guide the way. We ended up getting stranded under the cover of one of the warehouses when a thunderstorm let loose. 

Exterior space, model ship race

Interior with model ship event

Collections on display and in storage

Display cases

Outside collections

Historic cranes

Part of the museum? 

Caught in a thunderstorm  

I’m glad we experienced both museums - one traditional which taught us a great deal, one untraditional which felt more like an industrial playground. It was nice to learn both through exhibition labels and through actual hands-on exploration. I think this speaks to the amazing range one can find within the museum world.

Chicago Cultural Center - Theo Jansen's Strandbeests

The Chicago Cultural Center hosted an excellent exhibit of Theo Jansen’s Strandbeests this winter. I’ve long admired his mobile creatures, so it was wonderful to have the chance to see them up close. On display were black and white photographs of the beasts in action, a wide variety of the handcrafted pieces used in the sculptures, some hands-on demonstrations of engineering principles, and several retired Strandbeests. There were wranglers on standby for daily demonstrations, showing how the beasts harness and store wind power for self-mobilization.

I love the combination of engineering and aesthetics that go into Jansen’s work, and the exhibit showed off this pairing beautifully.