Chicago

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A couple of coincidences happened today. At breakfast over the road at the Hilton who should walk in but our dinner buddies on the American Queen, Allison and Lance, fellow NZers. They are staying at the same hotel and catching the same flight home on Friday night. We are hoping we will get away as a number of flights have been cancelled because of the heat and it’s meant to get hotter.

This morning we woke up to an impressive thunder storm and torrential rain. fortunately we had our trusty Kathmandu raincoats with us. Not like the first day we were here when a couple of nice security guards gave us their ponchos when we were caught short at the outdoor concert arena.

Free concerts or outdoor movies alternate at Millennium park but unfortunately at about 5pm each day the heavens open drenching us all. We finally got to see Anish Kapoor’s Cloud Gate sculpture. It is huge. People were having lots of fun photographing themselves and/or friends enjoying the strange views on the convex shiny surface. He is the same artist who made the red trumpet at Gibbs’ Farm.

Chicago is quite easy to get around. Ian has sorted out the buses and we just ride down Michigan Avenue to where ever we want to go.

The lakefront is quite interesting with a concrete beach that walkers, runners and cyclists share. If you step off, you are in the lake! At one end is a sandy beach. It was tempting but I didn’t have my togs with me. I had to be content with paddling in the water and trying not to get run over.

A shopping expedition to Bloomingdales was disappointing. Give me David Jones any day. We’ve really enjoyed the Art Institute which is the huge Art Museum similar to the Met in New York. An exhibition on Manet was interesting in that it was based around one painting, Jeanne, that had been in a private collection until purchased by the Getty Foundation in 1914. It certainly was very beautiful as were a number of his still lifes. Ian particularly liked a huge very famous Seurat painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte painted in 1884. Years ago Ian did a wood carving of the woman with the bustle and parasol. I’m not sure if he still has it. The modern section had a variety of Warhols, Lichtensteins and their contemporaries.

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Photos

The ‘bean’
By Anish Kapoor who also did the red trumpet at Gibbs’ Farm

Outdoor concert arena designed by Frank Gehry.
Free concerts and free movies during the summer, except when disrupted by thunderstorms!

‘American Gothic’
We’ve seen many paradise of this painting but here it was in the flesh. The real one.

I’m sure you can guess this one.
Picasso’s mistress Marie Therese