Art Blogger

A Short Tour of Ugly Art in Chicago

--Robert Klein Engler

"Vides has magnas edificationes?
Hic non relinquetur lapis super lapidem..."

The committee to decide if Chicago will host the 2016 Olympics has just left
the city. They did not visit me and ask my opinion. If they had, I would have
taken them on a tour of all the ugly public art in Chicago. Well, maybe not
all, but at least some. There is just too much ugly art to see in one day in
this city.

Chicago has more ugly public art than just about any U. S. city. The purpose
of this ugly art is to create an aura of internationalism and
multiculturalism. The consequence of all this ugliness is to deny the local and to
rewrite
Chicago history in favor of a moribund liberalism.

Because I did not have a chance to lead the Short Ugly Art Tour in person,
please join me as we do it on paper. Within the boundaries of a few square
blocks we can see five examples of really ugly public art.

We start the Short Ugly Art Tour at the Roosevelt L stop to look at the
banners that hang from the ceiling of the station done by children (1). We pass
then, to The Shedd Aquarium in Chicago's Museum Campus to see the statue "Man
with Fish" (2), then walk to Grant Park to see the forest of headless men called
the "Agora" (3) by Magdalena Abakanowicz. After that, we head up Clark Street
to the "Chicago Picasso" (4) in front of the Civic Center, and finally end our
tour in Millennium Park to see Anish Kapoor's "Cloud Gate," (5) or as it is
affectionately called, "The Kidney Bean."

Why are these five pieces of public art ugly? They are ugly because as
Aristotle would have us understand, for the most part they are not imitations of
virtuous actions, and if they are imitations of actions, they imitate actions
that are vulgar. Furthermore, they are not examples of what is good, true and
beautiful. They may be fine acquisitions in a private collection, but they offer
nothing that uplifts the public or encourages citizenship and virtue. In
short, they are ugly by being grotesque and inhuman.

Consider the posters that are on display at the Roosevelt Road station of the
L. One poster measures about 3 feet by 8 feet and hangs by wires from the
roof of the south exit where the Green and Orange lines stop. The poster depicts
a group of children in silhouette, outlined in various colors, just the way
the police leave a chalk outline of a body at a crime scene. Written on the
poster are these words: "A person's character should not be judged based on the
color of his skin but on the content." Then running down the middle of the
poster are the words: "I am black history in the making." The poster is signed by
"Christopher."

How could this happen? How could this dreadful poster be displayed in public,
at public expense, and offered as an example for self-improvement or
inspiration? How could Christopher's teachers at his school allow this to pass their
critical judgment? The quote is just plain wrong. Martin Luther King, Jr.,
never said this.

As propaganda this poster is a failure, too. In an odd way this poster takes
a truth and makes it a lie, not the way the Communist Party took the image of
the Soviet worker and made that into a lie, but by taking a lie and making
propaganda itself a lie that nobody cares about, anyway.

The poster put up by the CTA to make someone feel good says just the opposite
of what Rev. King intended, yet no one ever notices anything different and
they let the poster pass, to hang in public view. Is such an error tolerable
because it furthers a child's self-esteem? Furthermore, such a poster tells us
that Christopher's teachers probably didn't know the quote was wrong from the
beginning.

These CTA posters attempt to advance self-esteem at the expense of truth,
promote a false goodness of tolerance, and claim that the lack of talent or
technique means nothing for a work that ought to aim at beauty. How odd, that in an
effort to appease, the CTA has managed to turn public art into failed
propaganda.

A few blocks east, and in front of the Shedd Aquarium stands a sculpture
called "Man with Fish." It is a work by Stephan Balkenhol, dated September 2001
and is a "generous gift from William N. Sick in honor of his wife, Stephanie."

If all who are a party to the installation of this work have not heard of
Sigmund Freud and his study of unconscious symbolism, then they ought to, and
soon. It used to be vulgar to refer to a woman disparagingly as a "fish," but
from this public statue we conclude that is no longer the case. After looking at
a giant man and equally giant fish, what do you imagine his intentions to be?
Even worse, what were the intentions of the artist and the man who
commissioned this? Let's hope we do not see the imitation of that action in public any
time soon.

After viewing "Man with Fish," head east from Shedd Aquarium towards the
south end of Grant Park. There, you cannot help but see the "Agora" installation.
Donated to Chicago by the artist in 2006, "Agora" consists of 106 headless and
armless cast iron figures, over 9 feet tall, each weighing nearly eleven
hundred pounds. The figures are installed on land where the old Illinois Central
Railroad Station once stood.

Grant Park Advisory Council President Bob O'Niel claims that the sculptures
are "the most controversial art installation in Chicago in a long time." He
then added, "It is a wonderful project." Park District Commissioner Cindy
Mitchell agrees with O'Niel. She revealed also that bad taste among elites extends
far beyond Chicago. According to the Commissioner, famed actor and comedian
Robin Williams donated "a nice amount" to have the sculptures installed.

The British art historian Kenneth Clark suggests that every masterpiece is
rooted in the local. It then transcends the local to disclose the universal, and
in doing so tells us what it is to be human. Dismissed as so much bourgeois
propaganda by some progressives, Clark's ideas still remain a powerful
criticism of Abakanowicz's work in Chicago.

Chicago's dogs have a criticism of their own to express about ugly art, too.
A recent proposal to ban dogs from the area of the "Agora" is being
considered. It seems that the dogs see "Agora" as a series of tree stumps and express
their artistic opinion by peeing on the legs of the headless giants.

There are no local roots in this forest of headless torsos and legs.
Certainly, there are many local artists whose work could be put on public display in
the city. Furthermore, actions that could be imitated by art and displayed in
public are not wanting in Chicago, either. A firefighter saving a child from
the Our Lady of Angels school fire, or events surrounding the Fort Dearborn
Massacre are all worthy of public display. But to do this is to risk making a
value judgment. Modern art must be global in its reference, and thus denies the
value of the local.

When we leave the south end of Grant Park and head north on Clark Street we
eventually see the famed "Chicago Picasso." One of the problems with the
Picasso is that no one is quite sure what it represents. It does have a power of
attraction, as is the case with much that is ugly like wrecks on the highway, but
if it is a face, who would want to date and marry such a visage. It is hard
to live with those eyes! Perhaps, its best use is as a slide for schoolboys and
their skateboards.

In spite of its ugliness, Chicago's elite embraces this piece by Picasso.
What distinguishes it is not what it represents, but who did it. This statue is
famous because Picasso designed it. Its fame comes from the person and not the
noble action it imitates.

The "Chicago Picasso" is also an example of a parochial attitude among the
city's elite. Those who approved this statue admit by its presence that there is
no local artist whose works merits display in one of Chicago's plazas. What
is even more disappointing, Picasso himself never even visited Chicago.

The City Council admits in a resolution that reads in part, "Pablo Picasso
became a permanent part of Chicago, forever tied to the city he admired but
never saw, in a country he never visited, on August 15, 1967. It was on that day
that the Picasso sculpture in the Civic Center Plaza was unveiled." If an
artistic masterpiece has its roots in the local, then this Picasso is far from
greatness. At best it is ugly public art as propaganda in service of a failed
multiculturalism.

Many tourists from out of town and people from the suburbs claim to like the
"Kidney Bean." Bad taste is not just a Chicago phenomenon. It's another story
with people who live in Chicago and pay taxes. They wonder why this part of
the lakefront would be used to display constructions that have no connection
with Chicagoans except to raise their taxes.

The explanation for "Cloud Gate" by the artist clearly demonstrates that his
vision is mechanical, not human. Anish Kapoor states, "What I wanted to do in
Millennium Park is make something that would engage the Chicago skyline so
that one will see the clouds kind of floating in, with those very tall buildings
reflected in the work." As a mirror to our politics, "Cloud Gate" celebrates
corporate power but not citizenship and participatory democracy.

There is more ugly art to be seen in Chicago besides the five we may see in
this short tour. If you have another afternoon to waste, then visit Ellen
Lanyon's "Riverwalk Gateway," installed at the pedestrian and bicycle passageway
under the Lake Shore Drive Bridge. Or, you can take the Pink Line L to 18th
Street and see death, skeletons and the blood thirsty gods of Mexico. After this
you will understand why in this city where few vote, few also care little for
public art.

But wait! There is more. After wondering at the Picasso, why not walk north
to the Thompson Center and wonder more at Jean Dubuffet's black and white
monsters set in the plaza. There could be no better example of Dubuffet's
"revolutionary anti-cultural beliefs" than these obstacles to the building's entrance.
Here is further proof that modern art grows old more quickly than yesterday's
gossip.

At 131 South Dearborn Street, not too far from the Chicago Piccaso, is
something truly remarkable to see, a work that is old but has not grown old. In the
lobby of the Citadel Center there is a guilded reproduction of "The Winged
Victory of Samothrace." The original from about 220 BC stands near the Daru
staircase in the Louvre. This statue, by an unknown artist, is missing her head and
arms. She has wings and a flowing draped garment of stone, yet how remarkably
human she is.

A people may be judged by the image of the gods it worships. Compared to
Alexander Calder�s red "Flamingo" across the street in Federal Plaza with its
insect arches of steel, "The Winged Victory of Samothrace" is breathtaking.
Everyday many sons and daughters of Chicago walk past this stone goddess almost
ready to take flight. Her beauty makes the ugly public art of Chicago seem even
more ugly. Yet, it is golden and behind glass. It is not on the map of ugly
Chicago art. This is what we used to imagine. Money and politics in Chicago
confuses what we imagine, now.

If the occasion is right, then there is one more stop you may make in order
to realize the coming barbarism. There is one more stop to see the ugly set
against the beautiful. It's not a stop everone can make.

Pick an evening in autumn and walk to Preston Bradley Hall in Chicago�s old
library building, which is now the Chicago Cultural Center on Michigan Avenue.
Perhaps there will be a group playing chamber music in the hall. Ideally, it
would be a quartet by Beethoven. As the declining light of autumn reflects off
Lake Michigan, look past the hall�s hanging lamps and glistening mosaics and
through the arched windows towards the lake. Perhaps a flock of pigeons flashs
up and turns westward.

Then, outside, the twisted metal of Frank Gehry�s monstrosity of a music
pavilion meets your vision. Surely, you will believe now that fifty years of rule
by the Clan of Bridgeport has let loose a barbarism on this city. Look how
the window arches make a frame around an imago. What is to come upon us if this
is the architecture of our future? Waiting on the west side, waiting on the
south side, waiting in Little Village, they are sharpening their knives. The
thin line of prosperity running north and south along the lake shore is without
walls. In a few years, the barbarians will act out the horrors we build. Get
out while you can.

How many leave this vision with their eyes cast down? Viewing so much ugly
art may be depressing to the spirit, but let the viewer take heart. All is not
lost. There is an alternative future. According to the Nineteenth Annual
Landfill Capacity Report, "The capacity remaining in Illinois landfills as of
January 1, 2006, decreased slightly, less than one percent. The available space
overall should serve the State's residents for at least another 19 years." The
report only mentions residents, but we are sure they mean to include artists,
too.

In just a short time we have seen five modern works of art that can
rightfully be called ugly from the point of view of classical standards. These five
works also manifest another characteristic that is deadly to democracy: they are
a-historical and cut loose from tradition.

There is nothing in each of these pieces to remind viewers that they are in
Chicago. No Chicago traditions or events in Chicago's history are on display.
These works come to us from a demonic world of abstraction. They descend into
our world on the breath of a multicultural fascism. If you have eyes, then see.

e: RKleinEngler@aol.com

web: RobertKleinEngler.com

http://www.triplopia.org/inside.cfm?ct=624

Interview: http://adirondackreview.homestead.com/interviewengler.html

Robert Klein Engler is a writer and artist whose work is sometimes
characterized as politically incorrect. Born on the southwest side of Chicago, Robert
taught many years at Richard J. Daley College, until he was banned by the
chancellor. Robert holds degrees from the University of Illinois at Urbana and the
University of Chicago Divinity School. He has received 2 Illinois Arts Council
awards for his poetry. Just google his name to find his writing on the
Internet.