Palace of Fine Arts (Griffin MSI)

Latest Rabbit Hole

I’m working on a sort of walking tour—that is, a walk around Jackson Park area that would introduce people to Hyde Park’s history and why it makes sense that Obama’s Presidential Center is here. I have no idea how I would get it in the hands of visitors, but at least it will exist. I realized that I really need to talk about the building now known as the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry, even though there’s a lot people can encounter online. And yet, I discovered that even that provides rabbit holes for the unwary.

For instance, everyone has images of the south side of the building, which was the main entrance during the 1893 Columbian Exposition, but it’s really hard to scare up images of the north side or annex wings. Here’s the lagoon side—complete with ticket booth for the gondola ride on the steps, the giant statue of Athena in the middle of the steps, and the lions.

This south entrance is about to open up again with a way to get down to the ticket booths in the basement and a cafe. Here’s the architect’s rendering.

While checking out something else, I finally turned up a photo of the north side from the Field Museum’s collections, documenting when the building opened in 1894 as the Field Columbian, for random exhibits left behind from the fair. Here’s the opening day with crowds entering the north door and Caeser telling everyone they’d be better cooling off at the 57th Street beach. There’s a tiny little being clinging to his knee.

During the fair, he was pointing at the New York State Building.

Here’s what the north side looks like now (from Google Maps) with the entrance, which descends to the basement, far to the front. It’s designed for cars to park in the underground garage and the out-of-town visitors to never have to expose themselves to the scary south side. It’s a bit dull, to be honest. It could use a Caesar.

This quest started when a drone photo of the top dome was posted on Twitter (when it was Twitter). You could see the sea creatures supporting a thing that looked like a pedestal. You can see it in my tippy cherry tree photo here.

Many of the guidebooks were written and illustrated before the fair actually opened. The very early ones, especially the sketches and paintings, anticipate a statue on the dome. Here’s a drawing by Charles Graham done for Harper’s Weekly in September 1891 with a very large but vague shape on top of the dome.

Philip Martiny was the sculptor for the outside of the Palace of Fine Arts and did the caryatids, the Athena, the Parthenon frieze, and other literal-minded references to ancient Greece. As the fair neared opening, the newspapers described a 14-foot 6-inch statue carved in staff on the top of the dome, 125 feet in the air. Before she got her wings, the Tribune described it as “a Fine Figure.”

His colossal winged "Victory" stands poised upon a globe, her arms outstretched, tendering wreaths to whomsoever will win them. She is leaning slightly forward and seems rather to hover over than to stand upon what is beneath her. She stands well on the front of the globe with her toes pointing downward, suggesting that the sphere is moving forward. The lines of the drapery are graceful; the movement of the whole figure is spirited without being restless or extravagant. The type of woman is refined and intelligent without being being inspired by the classic. She is rather an elegant modern expression of a classic idea. Here’s a sketch of her from Martiny’s workshop as she looked February 12, 1893.

She does make an appearance in a very early photo that proves that she was actually put on the dome. For some reason, she ended up with very stiff, very large, horizontal wings. It wasn’t loved. The short (useful) version of Conklin's Guidebook referred to it as something that the critics were not in agreement about--which was really negative for Conklin.

But soon, early in the fair, when most of the official photographs for the souvenir books were being produced, Winged Victory was gone. Was it because everyone hated it? I have a theory that a 16-foot pile of staff with big wings catching the stiff Lake Michigan winds was just too much of a strain up there.

There was a bad storm at the end of April and the ceiling of the Palace of Fine Arts sprung leaks. No art was damaged but they couldn’t take any risks. My guess is that she was just quietly taken down. No article appeared in the newspapers, so I don’t think she blew down or was taken down after the fair opened when there would be quite a few witnesses. She's not listed in the catalog of Martiny's works at the fair. Even though there were a couple of mentions of her later, they were in articles that clearly contained text copied from earlier articles.

I was glad to see that I wasn’t the only one to wonder about it. A letter to the editor of the Tribune asked about both Winged Victory and Caesar (who was still around):

CHICAGO, Ill., Dec 14 .- Will you answer two questions for me in your Sunday's issue!

1. What became of "The Winged Victory" that once graced the dome of the Art Gallery at the Exposition?

2. Why was Cæsar Augustus represented by the ancient sculptors with a child beside him!

Signed, CURIOSITY.

Answer .- The fate of the "Winged Victory" is one of those mysteries without some search cannot be explained. No one among the many who would be supposed to know seems able to answer the question. Of course further inquiry will be made.

2. Cæsar Augustus was not so represented. The statue to which you refer is probably the large one which stood in front of the Art Palace. The little figure in that group-which, by the way, is a very bad little figure, artistically speaking-is not a child. It’s Cupid. The surmise is it’s there because of Virgil's claim that Augustus was descended from Venus.