Description and history
The Lorado Taft Midway Studio is a conglomeration of structures standing on the south side of the University of Chicago campus, on the west side of South Ingleside Avenue at East 60th Street. The northern end of the structure is a two-story Victorian house, from which a series of single-story sections extend southward, joining the house to adjacent two-story barn structures, one with a gabled roof and the other with a hip roof. Historically, these elements framed a courtyard that was open to the west, except for a fringing hedge and fence; this has since been filled by additional studio space. The interior is as rambling as the exterior, much of it composed of a warren of smaller studio spaces. [4]
Lorado Taft was educated at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, receiving both a bachelor's (1879) and master's degree (1880) in art. In the 1880s he continued his studies in Paris, and returned to Chicago in 1885, joining the faculty of the Chicago Art Institute in 1886. [4] In 1906, Taft moved his main studio from the Chicago Loop to a brick barn near the Midway Plaisance. Later, he connected a pair of frame barns to the main building to serve as male and female dormitories. The structure was redesigned by the architectural firm of Pond and Pond to contain 13 studios for Taft and affiliated sculptors. [5] [6]
The building was designated a National Historic Landmark on December 21, 1965, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966. [1] It is one of the four Chicago Registered Historic Places from the original October 15, 1966 National Register of Historic Places list (along with Chicago Pile-1, Hull House, and Robie House). [1] On December 1, 1993, it was named a Chicago Landmark. [3]
Today, the building is home to the university's Department of Visual Arts and Creative Writing program, and has been renovated to be classrooms, offices, and studios for students and faculty.
Lorado Zadok Taft was an American sculptor, writer and educator. His 1903 book, The History of American Sculpture, was the first survey of the subject and stood for decades as the standard reference. He has been credited with helping to advance the status of women as sculptors.
The Midway Plaisance, known locally as the Midway, is a Chicago public park on the South Side of Chicago, Illinois. It is one mile long by 220 yards wide and extends along 59th and 60th streets, joining Washington Park at its west end and Jackson Park at its east end. It divides the Hyde Park community area to the north from the Woodlawn community area to the south, 6 miles (10 km) south of the downtown "Loop", near Lake Michigan. Today, the Midway runs through the southern portion of the University of Chicago campus, with university and related buildings fronting it on both sides.
Richard W. Bock was an American sculptor and associate of Frank Lloyd Wright.
Washington Park is a 372-acre (1.5 km2) park between Cottage Grove Avenue and Martin Luther King Drive, located at 5531 S. Martin Luther King Dr. in the Washington Park community area on the South Side of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois. It was named for President George Washington in 1880. Washington Park is the largest of four Chicago Park District parks named after persons surnamed Washington. Located in the park is the DuSable Museum of African American History. This park was the proposed site of the Olympic Stadium and the Olympic swimming venue for Chicago's bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics. Washington Park was added to the National Register of Historic Places on August 20, 2004.
Fountain of Time, or simply Time, is a sculpture by Lorado Taft, measuring 126 feet 10 inches (38.66 m) in length, situated at the western edge of the Midway Plaisance within Washington Park in Chicago, Illinois, in the United States. This location is in the Washington Park community area on Chicago's South Side. Inspired by Henry Austin Dobson's poem "Paradox of Time", and with its 100 figures passing before Father Time, the work was created as a monument to the first 100 years of peace between the United States and the United Kingdom, resulting from the Treaty of Ghent in 1814. Although the fountain's water began running in 1920, the sculpture was not dedicated to the city until 1922. The sculpture is a contributing structure to the Washington Park United States Registered Historic District, which is a National Register of Historic Places listing.
There are more than 350 places listed on the United States National Register of Historic Places in Chicago, Illinois, including 83 historic districts that may include numerous historic buildings, structures, objects and sites. This total is documented in the tables referenced below. Tables of these listings may be found in the following articles:
Nellie Verne Walker, was an American sculptor best known for her statue of James Harlan formerly in the National Statuary Hall Collection in the United States Capitol, Washington D.C.
The Oregon Public Library is located in Oregon, Illinois, United States, the county seat of Ogle County. The building is a public library that was constructed in 1909. Prior to 1909, Oregon's library was housed in different buildings, none of which were designed to house a library. The library was built using a grant from wealthy philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. The grant was obtained after Oregon's citizens voted to change Oregon's library from a city library to a township library. The building was completed by 1908 but the library did not begin operation until 1909.
The Oregon Commercial Historic District is a historic district in Oregon, Illinois, that has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 2006. The district is roughly bordered by Jefferson, Franklin, 5th and 3rd Streets in Oregon. It is one of six Oregon sites listed on the National Register and one of three to be so listed since the turn of the 21st century. The other two are the Oregon Public Library, listed in 2003, and the Chana School, listed in 2005.
The Ogle County Courthouse is a National Register of Historic Places listing in the Ogle County, Illinois, county seat of Oregon. The building stands on a public square in the city's downtown commercial district. The current structure was completed in 1891 and was preceded by two other buildings, one of which was destroyed by a group of outlaws. Following the destruction of the courthouse, the county was without a judicial building for a period during the 1840s. The Ogle County Courthouse was designed by Chicago architect George O. Garnsey in the Romanesque Revival style of architecture. The ridged roof is dominated by its wooden cupola which stands out at a distance.
The Soldiers' Monument is a memorial consisting of three statues, one in bronze and two in marble by sculptor Lorado Taft, grouped around an exedra designed by the architectural firm of Pond and Pond. It is located in Oregon, Illinois, the county seat of Ogle County, Illinois. It was dedicated in 1916. The sculpture is part of the Oregon Commercial Historic District. The district was designated and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in August 2006.
The Eagle's Nest Art Colony, the site known in more modern times as the Lorado Taft Field Campus, was founded in 1898 by American sculptor Lorado Taft on the bluffs flanking the east bank of the Rock River, overlooking Oregon, Illinois. The colony was populated by Chicago artists, all members of the Chicago Art Institute or the University of Chicago art department, who gathered in Ogle County to escape the summer heat of Chicago. The colony complex has been used as a field campus for Northern Illinois University since 66 acres (27 ha) of Lowden State Park were turned over to the university by the state of Illinois.
Erected in 1927, the Victory Monument, created by sculptor Leonard Crunelle, was built to honor the Eighth Regiment of the Illinois National Guard, an African-American unit that served in France during World War I. It is located in the Black Metropolis-Bronzeville District in the Douglas community area of Chicago, Illinois. The structure was added to the National Register of Historic Places on April 30, 1986. It was designated a Chicago Landmark on September 9, 1998. An annual Memorial Day ceremony is held at the monument.
Fountain of the Great Lakes, or Spirit of the Great Lakes Fountain, is an allegorical sculpture and fountain by Lorado Taft. A bronze work of art, created between 1907 and 1913, the fountain depicts five women arranged so that the water flows in a way that seeks to recall the waterflow through the five Great Lakes of North America. In the Great Lakes, the waterflow begins in Lake Superior at 600 feet (180 m) above sea level and continues eastward through each lake until it reaches Lake Ontario. The Fountain is one of Taft's best known works. It is located in the public South McCormick Memorial Court of the Art Institute of Chicago, in the Chicago Loop.
Chesterwood was the summer estate and studio of American sculptor Daniel Chester French (1850–1931) located at 4 Williamsville Road in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Most of French's originally 150-acre (61 ha) estate is now owned by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which operates the property as a museum and sculpture garden. The property was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965 in recognition of French's importance in American sculpture.
Irving Kane Pond was an American architect, college athlete, and author. Born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Pond attended the University of Michigan and received a degree in civil engineering in 1879. He was a member of the first University of Michigan football team and scored the first touchdown in the school's history in May 1879.
Mabel Landrum Torrey was an American sculptor best known for her statuettes and sculptures of children. A number of her works were inspired by the poetry of Eugene Field.
The historic Chicago park and boulevard system is a ring of parks connected by wide, planted-median boulevards that winds through the north, west, and south sides of the City of Chicago. The neighborhoods along this historic stretch include, Logan Square, Humboldt Park, Englewood, Back of the Yards, Lawndale, and Bronzeville. It reaches as far west as Garfield Park and turns south east to Douglas Park. In the south, it reaches Washington Park and Jackson Park, including the Midway Plaisance, used for the 1893 World's Fair.
