Arts Club of Chicago
Encyclopedia
Arts Club of Chicago is a private club located in the Near North Side
community area
of Chicago
in Cook County, Illinois
, United States, a block east of the Magnificent Mile
, that exhibits international contemporary art
. It was founded in 1916, inspired by the success of the Art Institute of Chicago
's handling of the Armory Show
. Its founding was viewed as a statement that art had become an important component of civilized urban life. The Arts Club is said to have been pro-Modernist
from its founding. The Club strove to break new ground with its shows, rather than collect the works of established artists as the Art Institute does.
The club presented Pablo Picasso
's first United States showing. In addition, the 1951 exhibition by Jean Dubuffet
and his "Anticultural Positions" lecture at the Arts Club were tremendous influences on what would become the mid 1960s Imagist movement. Another important presentation in the history of the Arts Club was the Fernand Léger
showing of Le Ballet Mecanique.
The Club's 1997 move to its current 201 E. Ontario Street location was not without controversy, because the club demolished its former interior space designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
and moved only the central staircase to the new gallery space. However, the new space is 19000 square feet (1,765.2 m²), which is 7000 square feet (650.3 m²) larger than the old space.
showing traditional art and an internationally recognized museum. Additionally, the local mass media
gave equitable coverage to the visual arts. The art scene also had enough clubs and organizations for musicians, writers and artist
s. Unfortunately, the lively art scene did not adequately represent the avant-garde
art. The local galleries emphasized American, English and the occasional French work, emphasizing prints and drawings. This necessitated trips to New York City, London or Paris for Chicagoans who wanted to buy art.
The club does not generally show traveling exhibitions curated by others. Instead, it curates its own exhibits, often with very original works. This places emphasis on cutting edge and avant-garde art.
The club was founded in 1916 and experienced its first coverage in the Chicago Tribune
on March 16, 1916. It had office space in the Fine Arts Building
that became too limiting to serve the club's mission. In 1918, the club elected Rue Winterbotham Carpenter to replace Mrs. Robert McGann as president. She moved the club to 610 South Michigan Avenue
. The first exhibition included portraits by Whistler, Renoir
, Cassatt
, August Johns and others. By 1922, the club had outgrown its quarters and sponsored supplementary space at the Art Institute of Chicago until 1927 when the cost of doing so became prohibitive. In 1924, the club moved to the north tower of the Wrigley Building
. Among its first exhibitions at the Wrigley building was the first major United States show (seventeen sculptures, nineteen drawings and a painting) of Brancusi. The show was installed by Marcel Duchamp
. Rue Carpenter died on December 7, 1931, and Mrs. Charles Goodspeed was elected president in 1932. The club moved to more spacious accommodations at the Wrigley Building in 1936. "Bobsy" Goodspeed served as president until 1940. Then, Rue Winterbotham Carpenter's niece Rue Winterbotham Shaw was elected President. In 1947, the club scaled down its operations for four years after losing its Wrigley Building lease
. In 1951, it moved to 109 East Ontario in quarters built to specification that were designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
. Using Arts Club furnitur, he designed a gallery, dining room, and lecture hall in a pre-existing building. The gallery was built around Constantin Brâncuşi
's The Golden Bird and the stairway was renowned for its simplistic elegance. Shaw died in January 1979 and James Phinney Baxter was elected to serve until 1981 when Stanley Freehling was elected. The club struggled financially in the 1980s.
s including Richard Gray and Richard L. Feigen & Co. The Arts club did not own the land upon which their famous Mies clubhouse was built; instead, the club held the land in a longterm lease
hold. In 1990, the owner of 620 N. Michigan and the Arts Club land decided to sell. At first the Arts Club hoped to raise the money to purchase its land along with the 620 N. Michigan Avenue property in an effort spearheaded by Richard Gray, but it quickly became apparent that the club would lose a bidding war over this valuable land. A developer bought the property and demolished the entire block to make way for a movie complex and shopping center.
With the prospect of losing its home, the Arts Club opted to sell one of the most valuable items in its collection to finance the purchase of new land. The club decided to sell Brancusi's Bird to the Art Institute of Chicago. To finance the purchase, the Art Institute sold several second tier works from its famous Impressionist collection at Sotheby's in guaranteed lots which was a new concept in the auction
world in 1990. While without permanent home, the club continued to meet regularly in space loaned by the Casino, another famous Near North Side
club.
The 19000 square feet (1,765.2 m²) John Vinci designed building is a two-story structure that cost $
9 million for the land, building, landscaping
, and interior design
. The exterior facade
is buff brick
with black granite
windowsills and thresholds
and white-painted steel
windows. The building features furniture dating back to the club's founding as well as Mies van der Rohe designs. Several elements of the new building's design are considered homages to Mies. The fact that the building was so Miesian thirty years after his death while the club focussed on avant-gard art was a bit of a controversy. The building's atrium
that allows filtered light into the central galleries
and dining areas is its primary feature. Another focal point of the building is the restored Mies van der Rohe steel staircase that provides access to the second floor. The design includes white-painted steel, travertine marble
, floor-to-ceiling curtains, dark-stained wood floors, and large areas of glass. The color palette of saffron, black, gray, scarlet, and white is consistent with the former building. Also notable are the veil of north side metal screens. The building also has a 1600 square feet (148.6 m²) outdoor landscaped garden. The building accommodates a 200 person audience seating.
is a combination of acquisitions from its exhibitions and donations from both members and artists. It includes works by Georges Braque
, Alexander Calder
, Natalia Goncharova
, Paul Klee
, Henri Matisse
, Joan Miró
, Henry Moore
, Isamu Noguchi
, Francis Picabia
, and Pablo Picasso
. The club has made recent acquisitions of contemporary works by Malcolm Morley
, Alex Katz
, and Peter Doig
. The Club maintains a document collection, mostly of correspondence with its artists, at the Newberry Library
. Further information on the club collection can be found in The Arts Club of Chicago: The Collection 1916-1996 by Sophia Shaw, granddaughter of the Club's dynamic past president Rue Winterbotham Shaw.
was founded in 1929, Chicago and The Arts Club in particular was the most receptive exhibtor of modern art
in the United States. At that time, no institution in the United States, especially none in Manhattan, would exhibit European modernism
. By renting space at the Art Institute of Chicago
's Building
the Arts Club was able to arrange showings in Chicago's most prestigious museum.
The club has exhibited an impressive number of well-known 20th century visual artists. Many of the century's most controversial artists made their United States or midwest solo exhibition debuts at the club including: Alexander Calder, Marc Chagall
, Salvador Dalí
, Jean Dubuffet
, Pablo Picasso
, Jackson Pollock
, Auguste Rodin
, Georges Seurat, and Henri Toulouse-Lautrec. In addition, many artists have given lectures at the Club, including Martha Graham
, Kathleen Battle
, Leonard Bernstein
, Kenneth Branagh
and Robert Altman
. Aside from visual artists, the Club also has hosted lectures and performances from such prominent musicians as John Cage
, Philip Glass
, Ramsey Lewis
and Igor Stravinsky
, and poets W. H. Auden
, Gertrude Stein
and William Butler Yeats
. Most notable among these exhibitions was Picasso's first United States showing, Original Drawings by Pablo Picasso from March 20 to April 22, 1923, by the Arts Club at its installation at the Art Institute of Chicago. In the 1930s, when Isamu Noguchi
was still known as a sculptor, they hosted him. In 1970 when Varujan Boghosian was a timely sculptor known for depicting the legend of orpheus
, The Arts Club hosted a showing.
The first home at the Fine Arts Building
had no exhibition space. The club was not able to put on its first exhibition until December 18 when it moved to a location with exhibition space. The club's early gallery spaces were not sufficient to achieve the club's goals and it agreed to assume cost and selection responsibilities for works
in a series of shows at The Arts Club Exhibition Room at the Art Institute of Chicago from 1922-1927.
Near North Side, Chicago
The Near North Side is one of 77 well-defined community areas of Chicago, Illinois, United States. It is located north and east of the Chicago River, just north of the central business district . To its east is Lake Michigan and its northern boundary is the 19th-century city limit of Chicago,...
community area
Community areas of Chicago
Community areas in Chicago refers to the work of the Social Science Research Committee at University of Chicago which has unofficially divided the City of Chicago into 77 community areas. These areas are well-defined and static...
of Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
in Cook County, Illinois
Cook County, Illinois
Cook County is a county in the U.S. state of Illinois, with its county seat in Chicago. It is the second most populous county in the United States after Los Angeles County. The county has 5,194,675 residents, which is 40.5 percent of all Illinois residents. Cook County's population is larger than...
, United States, a block east of the Magnificent Mile
Magnificent Mile
The Magnificent Mile, sometimes referred to as The Mag Mile, is a neighborhood in Chicago, Illinois, that runs along a portion of Michigan Avenue extending from the Chicago River to Oak Street in the Near North Side community area. The district is located adjacent to downtown; it is also one block...
, that exhibits international contemporary art
Contemporary art
Contemporary art can be defined variously as art produced at this present point in time or art produced since World War II. The definition of the word contemporary would support the first view, but museums of contemporary art commonly define their collections as consisting of art produced...
. It was founded in 1916, inspired by the success of the Art Institute of Chicago
Art Institute of Chicago
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of America's largest accredited independent schools of art and design, located in the Loop in Chicago, Illinois. It is associated with the museum of the same name, and "The Art Institute of Chicago" or "Chicago Art Institute" often refers to either...
's handling of the Armory Show
Armory Show
Many exhibitions have been held in the vast spaces of U.S. National Guard armories, but the Armory Show refers to the 1913 International Exhibition of Modern Art that was organized by the Association of American Painters and Sculptors...
. Its founding was viewed as a statement that art had become an important component of civilized urban life. The Arts Club is said to have been pro-Modernist
Modernism
Modernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes the modernist movement, its set of cultural tendencies and array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western society...
from its founding. The Club strove to break new ground with its shows, rather than collect the works of established artists as the Art Institute does.
The club presented Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
's first United States showing. In addition, the 1951 exhibition by Jean Dubuffet
Jean Dubuffet
Jean Philippe Arthur Dubuffet was a French painter and sculptor. His idealistic approach to aesthetics embraced so called "low art" and eschewed traditional standards of beauty in favor of what he believed to be a more authentic and humanistic approach to image-making.-Life and work:Dubuffet was...
and his "Anticultural Positions" lecture at the Arts Club were tremendous influences on what would become the mid 1960s Imagist movement. Another important presentation in the history of the Arts Club was the Fernand Léger
Fernand Léger
Joseph Fernand Henri Léger was a French painter, sculptor, and filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of Cubism which he gradually modified into a more figurative, populist style...
showing of Le Ballet Mecanique.
The Club's 1997 move to its current 201 E. Ontario Street location was not without controversy, because the club demolished its former interior space designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe was a German architect. He is commonly referred to and addressed as Mies, his surname....
and moved only the central staircase to the new gallery space. However, the new space is 19000 square feet (1,765.2 m²), which is 7000 square feet (650.3 m²) larger than the old space.
Mission and purpose
The inaugural mission of the club was "to encourage higher standards of art, maintain galleries for that purpose, and to promote the mutual acquaintance of art lovers and art workers." This mission arose from the contemporary Chicago active art scene, which had 30 commercial art galleriesArt gallery
An art gallery or art museum is a building or space for the exhibition of art, usually visual art.Museums can be public or private, but what distinguishes a museum is the ownership of a collection...
showing traditional art and an internationally recognized museum. Additionally, the local mass media
Mass media
Mass media refers collectively to all media technologies which are intended to reach a large audience via mass communication. Broadcast media transmit their information electronically and comprise of television, film and radio, movies, CDs, DVDs and some other gadgets like cameras or video consoles...
gave equitable coverage to the visual arts. The art scene also had enough clubs and organizations for musicians, writers and artist
Artist
An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
s. Unfortunately, the lively art scene did not adequately represent the avant-garde
Avant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
art. The local galleries emphasized American, English and the occasional French work, emphasizing prints and drawings. This necessitated trips to New York City, London or Paris for Chicagoans who wanted to buy art.
The club does not generally show traveling exhibitions curated by others. Instead, it curates its own exhibits, often with very original works. This places emphasis on cutting edge and avant-garde art.
History
Chicago Tribune
The Chicago Tribune is a major daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and the flagship publication of the Tribune Company. Formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" , it remains the most read daily newspaper of the Chicago metropolitan area and the Great Lakes region and is...
on March 16, 1916. It had office space in the Fine Arts Building
Fine Arts Building (Chicago)
The ten-story Fine Arts Building, also known as the Studebaker Building, is located on Michigan Avenue across from Grant Park in Chicago in the Chicago Landmark Historic Michigan Boulevard District. It was built for the Studebaker company in 1884–5 by Solon Spencer Beman, and extensively remodeled...
that became too limiting to serve the club's mission. In 1918, the club elected Rue Winterbotham Carpenter to replace Mrs. Robert McGann as president. She moved the club to 610 South Michigan Avenue
Michigan Avenue (Chicago)
Michigan Avenue is a major north-south street in Chicago which runs at 100 east south of the Chicago River and at 132 East north of the river from 12628 south to 950 north in the Chicago street address system...
. The first exhibition included portraits by Whistler, Renoir
Renoir
-People with the surname Renoir :* Pierre-Auguste Renoir , French painter* Pierre Renoir , French actor and son of Pierre-Auguste Renoir* Jean Renoir , French film director and son of Pierre-Auguste Renoir...
, Cassatt
Mary Cassatt
Mary Stevenson Cassatt was an American painter and printmaker. She lived much of her adult life in France, where she first befriended Edgar Degas and later exhibited among the Impressionists...
, August Johns and others. By 1922, the club had outgrown its quarters and sponsored supplementary space at the Art Institute of Chicago until 1927 when the cost of doing so became prohibitive. In 1924, the club moved to the north tower of the Wrigley Building
Wrigley Building
The Wrigley Building is a skyscraper located directly across Michigan Avenue from the Tribune Tower on the Magnificent Mile...
. Among its first exhibitions at the Wrigley building was the first major United States show (seventeen sculptures, nineteen drawings and a painting) of Brancusi. The show was installed by Marcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp
Marcel Duchamp was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. Considered by some to be one of the most important artists of the 20th century, Duchamp's output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art...
. Rue Carpenter died on December 7, 1931, and Mrs. Charles Goodspeed was elected president in 1932. The club moved to more spacious accommodations at the Wrigley Building in 1936. "Bobsy" Goodspeed served as president until 1940. Then, Rue Winterbotham Carpenter's niece Rue Winterbotham Shaw was elected President. In 1947, the club scaled down its operations for four years after losing its Wrigley Building lease
Lease
A lease is a contractual arrangement calling for the lessee to pay the lessor for use of an asset. A rental agreement is a lease in which the asset is tangible property...
. In 1951, it moved to 109 East Ontario in quarters built to specification that were designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe was a German architect. He is commonly referred to and addressed as Mies, his surname....
. Using Arts Club furnitur, he designed a gallery, dining room, and lecture hall in a pre-existing building. The gallery was built around Constantin Brâncuşi
Constantin Brancusi
Constantin Brâncuşi was a Romanian-born sculptor who made his career in France. As a child he displayed an aptitude for carving wooden farm tools. Formal studies took him first to Bucharest, then to Munich, then to the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris...
's The Golden Bird and the stairway was renowned for its simplistic elegance. Shaw died in January 1979 and James Phinney Baxter was elected to serve until 1981 when Stanley Freehling was elected. The club struggled financially in the 1980s.
1990s - new building
In the 1990s, the club was located west of Michigan Avenue and behind the 620 building which was home to many of Chicago's finest art dealerArt dealer
An art dealer is a person or company that buys and sells works of art. Art dealers' professional associations serve to set high standards for accreditation or membership and to support art exhibitions and shows.-Role:...
s including Richard Gray and Richard L. Feigen & Co. The Arts club did not own the land upon which their famous Mies clubhouse was built; instead, the club held the land in a longterm lease
Lease
A lease is a contractual arrangement calling for the lessee to pay the lessor for use of an asset. A rental agreement is a lease in which the asset is tangible property...
hold. In 1990, the owner of 620 N. Michigan and the Arts Club land decided to sell. At first the Arts Club hoped to raise the money to purchase its land along with the 620 N. Michigan Avenue property in an effort spearheaded by Richard Gray, but it quickly became apparent that the club would lose a bidding war over this valuable land. A developer bought the property and demolished the entire block to make way for a movie complex and shopping center.
With the prospect of losing its home, the Arts Club opted to sell one of the most valuable items in its collection to finance the purchase of new land. The club decided to sell Brancusi's Bird to the Art Institute of Chicago. To finance the purchase, the Art Institute sold several second tier works from its famous Impressionist collection at Sotheby's in guaranteed lots which was a new concept in the auction
Auction
An auction is a process of buying and selling goods or services by offering them up for bid, taking bids, and then selling the item to the highest bidder...
world in 1990. While without permanent home, the club continued to meet regularly in space loaned by the Casino, another famous Near North Side
Near North Side, Chicago
The Near North Side is one of 77 well-defined community areas of Chicago, Illinois, United States. It is located north and east of the Chicago River, just north of the central business district . To its east is Lake Michigan and its northern boundary is the 19th-century city limit of Chicago,...
club.
The 19000 square feet (1,765.2 m²) John Vinci designed building is a two-story structure that cost $
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
9 million for the land, building, landscaping
Landscaping
Landscaping refers to any activity that modifies the visible features of an area of land, including:# living elements, such as flora or fauna; or what is commonly referred to as gardening, the art and craft of growing plants with a goal of creating a beautiful environment within the landscape.#...
, and interior design
Interior design
Interior design describes a group of various yet related projects that involve turning an interior space into an effective setting for the range of human activities are to take place there. An interior designer is someone who conducts such projects...
. The exterior facade
Facade
A facade or façade is generally one exterior side of a building, usually, but not always, the front. The word comes from the French language, literally meaning "frontage" or "face"....
is buff brick
Brick
A brick is a block of ceramic material used in masonry construction, usually laid using various kinds of mortar. It has been regarded as one of the longest lasting and strongest building materials used throughout history.-History:...
with black granite
Granite
Granite is a common and widely occurring type of intrusive, felsic, igneous rock. Granite usually has a medium- to coarse-grained texture. Occasionally some individual crystals are larger than the groundmass, in which case the texture is known as porphyritic. A granitic rock with a porphyritic...
windowsills and thresholds
Thresholds
Thresholds is the second full-length studio album from Florida death metal band Nocturnus. It was released in 1992 by Earache Records and follows the band's debut album The Key....
and white-painted steel
Steel
Steel is an alloy that consists mostly of iron and has a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.1% by weight, depending on the grade. Carbon is the most common alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used, such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten...
windows. The building features furniture dating back to the club's founding as well as Mies van der Rohe designs. Several elements of the new building's design are considered homages to Mies. The fact that the building was so Miesian thirty years after his death while the club focussed on avant-gard art was a bit of a controversy. The building's atrium
Atrium (architecture)
In modern architecture, an atrium is a large open space, often several stories high and having a glazed roof and/or large windows, often situated within a larger multistory building and often located immediately beyond the main entrance doors...
that allows filtered light into the central galleries
Art gallery
An art gallery or art museum is a building or space for the exhibition of art, usually visual art.Museums can be public or private, but what distinguishes a museum is the ownership of a collection...
and dining areas is its primary feature. Another focal point of the building is the restored Mies van der Rohe steel staircase that provides access to the second floor. The design includes white-painted steel, travertine marble
Marble
Marble is a metamorphic rock composed of recrystallized carbonate minerals, most commonly calcite or dolomite.Geologists use the term "marble" to refer to metamorphosed limestone; however stonemasons use the term more broadly to encompass unmetamorphosed limestone.Marble is commonly used for...
, floor-to-ceiling curtains, dark-stained wood floors, and large areas of glass. The color palette of saffron, black, gray, scarlet, and white is consistent with the former building. Also notable are the veil of north side metal screens. The building also has a 1600 square feet (148.6 m²) outdoor landscaped garden. The building accommodates a 200 person audience seating.
Collection
The Arts Club's collectionCollection (museum)
A museum is distinguished by a collection of often unique objects that forms the core of its activities for exhibitions, education, research, etc. This differentiates it from an archive or library, where the contents may be more paper-based, replaceable and less exhibition oriented...
is a combination of acquisitions from its exhibitions and donations from both members and artists. It includes works by Georges Braque
Georges Braque
Georges Braque[p] was a major 20th century French painter and sculptor who, along with Pablo Picasso, developed the art style known as Cubism.-Early Life:...
, Alexander Calder
Alexander Calder
Alexander Calder was an American sculptor and artist most famous for inventing mobile sculptures. In addition to mobile and stable sculpture, Alexander Calder also created paintings, lithographs, toys, tapestry, jewelry and household objects.-Childhood:Alexander "Sandy" Calder was born in Lawnton,...
, Natalia Goncharova
Natalia Goncharova
Natalia Sergeevna Goncharova was a Russian avant-garde artist , painter, costume designer, writer, illustrator, and set designer. Her great-aunt was Natalia Pushkina, wife of the poet Alexander Pushkin.-Life and work:...
, Paul Klee
Paul Klee
Paul Klee was born in Münchenbuchsee, Switzerland, and is considered both a German and a Swiss painter. His highly individual style was influenced by movements in art that included expressionism, cubism, and surrealism. He was, as well, a student of orientalism...
, Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse was a French artist, known for his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primarily as a painter...
, Joan Miró
Joan Miró
Joan Miró i Ferrà was a Spanish Catalan painter, sculptor, and ceramicist born in Barcelona.Earning international acclaim, his work has been interpreted as Surrealism, a sandbox for the subconscious mind, a re-creation of the childlike, and a manifestation of Catalan pride...
, Henry Moore
Henry Moore
Henry Spencer Moore OM CH FBA was an English sculptor and artist. He was best known for his semi-abstract monumental bronze sculptures which are located around the world as public works of art....
, Isamu Noguchi
Isamu Noguchi
was a prominent Japanese American artist and landscape architect whose artistic career spanned six decades, from the 1920s onward. Known for his sculpture and public works, Noguchi also designed stage sets for various Martha Graham productions, and several mass-produced lamps and furniture pieces,...
, Francis Picabia
Francis Picabia
Francis Picabia was a French painter, poet, and typographist, associated with both the Dada and Surrealist art movements.- Early life :...
, and Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
. The club has made recent acquisitions of contemporary works by Malcolm Morley
Malcolm Morley
Malcolm Morley is an English artist now living in the United States. He is best known as a photorealist.-Early life:Morley was born in north London. He had a troubled childhood, and did not discover art until serving a three-year stint in Wormwood Scrubs prison...
, Alex Katz
Alex Katz
Alex Katz is an American figurative artist associated with the Pop art movement. In particular, he is known for his paintings, sculptures, and prints and is represented by numerous galleries internationally.-Life and work:...
, and Peter Doig
Peter Doig
Peter Doig is a contemporary artist born in Scotland. In 2007, a painting of Doig's, entitled White Canoe, sold at Sotheby's for $11.3 million, then an auction record for a living European artist.-Early life:...
. The Club maintains a document collection, mostly of correspondence with its artists, at the Newberry Library
Newberry Library
The Newberry Library is a privately endowed, independent research library for the humanities and social sciences in Chicago, Illinois. Although it is private, non-circulating library, the Newberry Library is free and open to the public...
. Further information on the club collection can be found in The Arts Club of Chicago: The Collection 1916-1996 by Sophia Shaw, granddaughter of the Club's dynamic past president Rue Winterbotham Shaw.
Highlights
Notable works in the club's private collection include:- Red Petals, plate steel, steel wire, sheet aluminum, soft-iron bolts, and aluminum paint, 19421942 in art-Awards:*Archibald Prize: William Dargie - Corporal Jim Gordon, VC-Works:*Rita Angus - Portrait *Pierre Bonnard - Red Roofs in Cannet*Paul-Émile Borduas - Abstraction No 7*Edward Hopper - Nighthawks...
, by Alexander Calder - Main Staircase for The Arts Club of Chicago, steel, travertine marble, 19481948 in art-Paintings:*Russell Drysdale - The cricketers*Rudolf Hausner - It's Me!*Henri Matisse - The Plum Blossoms*Barnett Newman - Onement I*Jackson Pollock - No...
-19511951 in art-Events:*The Festival of Britain includes a mural by John Tunnard and new buildings designed by a team of architects led by Hugh Casson.*Sculptor Henry Moore refuses the offer of a knighthood....
, by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe - Untitled, charcoalCharcoalCharcoal is the dark grey residue consisting of carbon, and any remaining ash, obtained by removing water and other volatile constituents from animal and vegetation substances. Charcoal is usually produced by slow pyrolysis, the heating of wood or other substances in the absence of oxygen...
on ivory laid paper, 19221922 in art-Awards:*Archibald Prize: W B McInnes - Professor Harrison Moore*Newbery Medal - Rene Paul Chambellan-Works:*Max Beckmann - The Iron Footbridge*Lydia Field Emmet - Harriet Lancashire White and Her Children*L. S...
, by Henri Matisse - Personage and Birds in Front of the Sun , ink and gouache on paper, 19421942 in art-Awards:*Archibald Prize: William Dargie - Corporal Jim Gordon, VC-Works:*Rita Angus - Portrait *Pierre Bonnard - Red Roofs in Cannet*Paul-Émile Borduas - Abstraction No 7*Edward Hopper - Nighthawks...
, by Joan Miró - This Thing is Made to Perpetuate My Memory (Cette Chose est faite pour perpetuer mon souvenir), ink, gouache or watercolor, and silver and bronze paint on board, 19151915 in art-Events:*Harper's Bazaar hires Erté to design its covers.*Ambrose Heal and others found the Design and Industries Association in London.*The only Vorticist exhibition is staged, at the Doré Gallery in London..-Works:*Frank Weston Benson - Red and Gold...
, by Francis Picabia - Head of a Woman (Tete de femme), red and black chalk with chalk wash on tan laid paper, laid down on lightweight Japanese paper, 1922, by Pablo Picasso
Exhibitions, performances and lectures
Until the Museum of Modern ArtMuseum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
was founded in 1929, Chicago and The Arts Club in particular was the most receptive exhibtor of modern art
Modern art
Modern art includes artistic works produced during the period extending roughly from the 1860s to the 1970s, and denotes the style and philosophy of the art produced during that era. The term is usually associated with art in which the traditions of the past have been thrown aside in a spirit of...
in the United States. At that time, no institution in the United States, especially none in Manhattan, would exhibit European modernism
Modernism
Modernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes the modernist movement, its set of cultural tendencies and array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western society...
. By renting space at the Art Institute of Chicago
Art Institute of Chicago
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of America's largest accredited independent schools of art and design, located in the Loop in Chicago, Illinois. It is associated with the museum of the same name, and "The Art Institute of Chicago" or "Chicago Art Institute" often refers to either...
's Building
Art Institute of Chicago Building
The Art Institute of Chicago Building houses the Art Institute of Chicago, and is located in the Chicago Landmark Historic Michigan Boulevard District in the Loop community area of Chicago, Illinois. The building is also located in Grant Park on the east side of Michigan Avenue, and marks the third...
the Arts Club was able to arrange showings in Chicago's most prestigious museum.
The club has exhibited an impressive number of well-known 20th century visual artists. Many of the century's most controversial artists made their United States or midwest solo exhibition debuts at the club including: Alexander Calder, Marc Chagall
Marc Chagall
Marc Chagall Art critic Robert Hughes referred to Chagall as "the quintessential Jewish artist of the twentieth century."According to art historian Michael J...
, Salvador Dalí
Salvador Dalí
Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....
, Jean Dubuffet
Jean Dubuffet
Jean Philippe Arthur Dubuffet was a French painter and sculptor. His idealistic approach to aesthetics embraced so called "low art" and eschewed traditional standards of beauty in favor of what he believed to be a more authentic and humanistic approach to image-making.-Life and work:Dubuffet was...
, Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
, Jackson Pollock
Jackson Pollock
Paul Jackson Pollock , known as Jackson Pollock, was an influential American painter and a major figure in the abstract expressionist movement. During his lifetime, Pollock enjoyed considerable fame and notoriety. He was regarded as a mostly reclusive artist. He had a volatile personality, and...
, Auguste Rodin
Auguste Rodin
François-Auguste-René Rodin , known as Auguste Rodin , was a French sculptor. Although Rodin is generally considered the progenitor of modern sculpture, he did not set out to rebel against the past...
, Georges Seurat, and Henri Toulouse-Lautrec. In addition, many artists have given lectures at the Club, including Martha Graham
Martha Graham
Martha Graham was an American modern dancer and choreographer whose influence on dance has been compared with the influence Picasso had on modern visual arts, Stravinsky had on music, or Frank Lloyd Wright had on architecture.She danced and choreographed for over seventy years...
, Kathleen Battle
Kathleen Battle
Kathleen Battle , is an African-American operatic soprano known for her agile and light voice and her silvery, pure tone. Battle initially became known for her work within the concert repertoire through performances with major orchestras during the early and mid 1970s. She made her opera debut in...
, Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
, Kenneth Branagh
Kenneth Branagh
Kenneth Charles Branagh is an actor and film director from Northern Ireland. He is best known for directing and starring in several film adaptations of William Shakespeare's plays including Henry V , Much Ado About Nothing , Hamlet Kenneth Charles Branagh is an actor and film director from...
and Robert Altman
Robert Altman
Robert Bernard Altman was an American film director and screenwriter known for making films that are highly naturalistic, but with a stylized perspective. In 2006, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences recognized his body of work with an Academy Honorary Award.His films MASH , McCabe and...
. Aside from visual artists, the Club also has hosted lectures and performances from such prominent musicians as John Cage
John Cage
John Milton Cage Jr. was an American composer, music theorist, writer, philosopher and artist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde...
, Philip Glass
Philip Glass
Philip Glass is an American composer. He is considered to be one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century and is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public .His music is often described as minimalist, along with...
, Ramsey Lewis
Ramsey Lewis
Ramsey Emmanuel Lewis, Jr. is an American jazz composer, pianist and radio personality. Ramsey Lewis has recorded over 80 albums and has received seven gold records and three Grammy Awards so far in his career.-Biography:...
and Igor Stravinsky
Igor Stravinsky
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ; 6 April 1971) was a Russian, later naturalized French, and then naturalized American composer, pianist, and conductor....
, and poets W. H. Auden
W. H. Auden
Wystan Hugh Auden , who published as W. H. Auden, was an Anglo-American poet,The first definition of "Anglo-American" in the OED is: "Of, belonging to, or involving both England and America." See also the definition "English in origin or birth, American by settlement or citizenship" in See also...
, Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein was an American writer, poet and art collector who spent most of her life in France.-Early life:...
and William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet and playwright, and one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years he served as an Irish Senator for two terms...
. Most notable among these exhibitions was Picasso's first United States showing, Original Drawings by Pablo Picasso from March 20 to April 22, 1923, by the Arts Club at its installation at the Art Institute of Chicago. In the 1930s, when Isamu Noguchi
Isamu Noguchi
was a prominent Japanese American artist and landscape architect whose artistic career spanned six decades, from the 1920s onward. Known for his sculpture and public works, Noguchi also designed stage sets for various Martha Graham productions, and several mass-produced lamps and furniture pieces,...
was still known as a sculptor, they hosted him. In 1970 when Varujan Boghosian was a timely sculptor known for depicting the legend of orpheus
Orpheus
Orpheus was a legendary musician, poet, and prophet in ancient Greek religion and myth. The major stories about him are centered on his ability to charm all living things and even stones with his music; his attempt to retrieve his wife from the underworld; and his death at the hands of those who...
, The Arts Club hosted a showing.
Locations
The current location is the club's seventh location. However, this is the first building owned by the club. The location history is listed below.The first home at the Fine Arts Building
Fine Arts Building (Chicago)
The ten-story Fine Arts Building, also known as the Studebaker Building, is located on Michigan Avenue across from Grant Park in Chicago in the Chicago Landmark Historic Michigan Boulevard District. It was built for the Studebaker company in 1884–5 by Solon Spencer Beman, and extensively remodeled...
had no exhibition space. The club was not able to put on its first exhibition until December 18 when it moved to a location with exhibition space. The club's early gallery spaces were not sufficient to achieve the club's goals and it agreed to assume cost and selection responsibilities for works
Visual arts
The visual arts are art forms that create works which are primarily visual in nature, such as ceramics, drawing, painting, sculpture, printmaking, design, crafts, and often modern visual arts and architecture...
in a series of shows at The Arts Club Exhibition Room at the Art Institute of Chicago from 1922-1927.
| Name | Street Address | Years | Architect/Interior Designer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fine Arts Building Fine Arts Building (Chicago) The ten-story Fine Arts Building, also known as the Studebaker Building, is located on Michigan Avenue across from Grant Park in Chicago in the Chicago Landmark Historic Michigan Boulevard District. It was built for the Studebaker company in 1884–5 by Solon Spencer Beman, and extensively remodeled... |
401 S. Michigan Avenue Michigan Avenue (Chicago) Michigan Avenue is a major north-south street in Chicago which runs at 100 east south of the Chicago River and at 132 East north of the river from 12628 south to 950 north in the Chicago street address system... |
1916-18 | Arthur Heun/Rue Winterbotham Carpenter |
| 610 S. Michigan Avenue | 1918-24 | Arthur Heun/Rue Winterbotham Carpenter | |
| Wrigley Building Wrigley Building The Wrigley Building is a skyscraper located directly across Michigan Avenue from the Tribune Tower on the Magnificent Mile... (north tower) |
410 N. Michigan Avenue | 1924-36 | Arthur Heun/Rue Winterbotham Carpenter |
| Wrigley Building Wrigley Building The Wrigley Building is a skyscraper located directly across Michigan Avenue from the Tribune Tower on the Magnificent Mile... (south tower) |
410 N. Michigan Avenue | 1936-47 | Arthur Heun/Elizabeth "Bobsy" Goodspeed Chapman |
| 109 E. Ontario Street | 1951-95 | Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Ludwig Mies van der Rohe was a German architect. He is commonly referred to and addressed as Mies, his surname.... |
|
| 222 W. Superior Street | 1995-97 | ||
| 201 E. Ontario Street | 1997- | Vinci/Hamp Architects, Inc. |
Leadership
The club has had seven Presidents:| Name | Years |
|---|---|
| Mrs. Robert McGann | 1916-18 |
| Rue Winterbotham Carpenter | 1918-31 |
| Elizabeth "Bobsy" Goodspeed | 1932-40 |
| Rue Winterbotham Shaw | 1940-79 |
| James Phinney Baxter IV | 1979-81 |
| Stanley M. Freehling | 1981–2005 |
| Marilynn B. Alsdorf | 2005–present |