 |
| Early morning sunlight shines on the Chicago Loop |
The Streets of Chicago
memoir
by Gregory E. Larson
Some people say that big cities never sleep. I’ll take
exception to that. Sometimes they are almost asleep. At least, that is what it
seemed when I walked the empty sidewalks of downtown Chicago on a Sunday Spring
morning years ago. For an architect, Chicago is like a candy store with
buildings dripping with a wide variety of details.
When the light cracked through the curtains at the
Burnham Hotel (the historical Reliance Building), I couldn’t resist the
temptation to go exploring on my own. I pulled on my clothes, rode the
elevator, then slipped out into the quiet of the early morning. The sunlight reflected
off the tops of the buildings and the light filtered down into the urban
canyons.
Rarely a car passed by, and I saw few pedestrians. The
“L” was operating but the cars looked empty. I made slow footsteps, peering up
at terra cotta details and looking down alleyways. The contrast of the shadows
and light gave way to thoughts of the Jimi Hendrix song The Wind Cries Mary, with the line “the traffic lights, they turn
blue tomorrow,” and more thoughts of slow, bluesy saxophone jazz that
accompanies the detective stories.
 |
| An empty Michigan Avenue |
It was an odd feeling to be in a quiet interlude of a
vibrant city. I kept walking towards Michigan Avenue near the Art Institute.
Empty streets there, too. Every so often I’d take a photo of a detail or a
window. I kept walking, looking down streets I’d never seen before. One block
west of Michigan Avenue there was a small street that was almost as narrow as
an alley, but it was a designated street named Garland Court. I turned north and
looked at an amazing patchwork-quilt of building sizes and styles. To my right
was a classical-style building with a huge overhanging cornice at the top. To
my left was a new building of stone and glass. The morning light shone brightly
on the tops of the buildings, but the old-style streetlamps were still shining
along Garland Court.
 |
| "A Slice in Time - Chicago 2008" (2021 watercolor by Gregory E. Larson) |
Looking north to the intersection at Randolph Street,
there was an old stucco building with stone trim and a modern brick building
with an atrium at the front. Beyond that was a stunning mixture of buildings
and colors. In the distance, the Trump tower with cranes at the top was under
construction along the Chicago River, on the site which the Chicago Sun-Times building
once occupied. I had attended a continuing-education session for architects in
Kansas City and learned the concrete used in the Trump Tower was a new
innovative chemical mixture that was 40% stronger than typical concrete. The
soupy mix design allowed it to be pumped over 1,000 vertical feet. The curing
time for the concrete was much faster than standard mixes, thus the forms were
removed and the project was allowed to rise at a rapid rate.
There was also a neo-gothic pencil-like tower that
I’ve since learned is the Mather Building (The Chicago Quarters Hotel). A man
named Mather was a railroad magnate who built railroad cars. He commissioned
the design and construction of what was then the tallest building in Chicago at
42 stories when it was completed in 1928. I took photos of what I thought was
the prize view of the early-morning exploration. Since I rarely get to the
large cities, this was the gemstone of my Sunday morning wandering.
Over a decade later, as I started painting the
watercolors, I went back to the Chicago image, made a copy and showed it to one
of my art instructors. He said, “Greg, I think you are biting off more than you
can chew. You should wait and save that for a time after you’ve gotten a lot
more painting experience.
This year I decided to really push myself to take on
larger and more difficult paintings. It felt like the time was right to tackle
the painting of the Chicago view. I researched the surroundings on Google
“street view” and the internet. I learned the building on the left is a condo
tower named The Heritage at Millenium Park. At the time of its
completion in 2005 at 57 stories, it was the largest and tallest condo building
in Chicago. Taller residential towers have since sprouted in Chicago and other
large cities to satisfy the market for spaces with magnificent views out onto
the cityscapes.
As I planned the painting, I realized the street
looked so empty on that Sunday morning, so I decided to add a 2008 Ford,
Crown-Vic cab on the street, and to add more action, I painted myself (my
better side) walking north on the right sidewalk.
To my surprise, I discovered that part of the view I photographed in 2008 no longer exists. Two blocks north of where I took the photo, a new building blocks the view of the Mather Building. It made me realize that I was very lucky to see the older view, being there on that Sunday morning with the early light, thus I gave the painting the title of “A Slice in Time – Chicago 2008.”
 |
| Neo-Gothic detail on a Chicago building |
