Saturday, February 27, 2010

From the Art Institute of Chicago

On my birthday back in December Dick promised me a day trip to Chicago and the Art Institute.  I wanted to see the new modern wing, and to revisit some "old friends."   We drove to Harvard, Illinois, about a half hour from here, and took the Metra line to downtown Chicago.  The trip is a hundred miles, and takes a couple hours.  It was a nice day, clear, weather in the 40s, so we walked to Michigan Avenue, and got in for free, since the museum had a promotion of every day in February free admission.


It is OK to take photos in the museum as long as no flash is  used, so I took all sort of pictures of sculptures, and have only now gotten around to using them to add in my little watercolor sketchbook.  I want to do some more, but I'm not sure I'll have time before our trip to Italy, and after that I bet I'll want to work on other sketches.

Anyway, we explored all day, taking an hour off for lunch at a nearby Italian restaurant, and then returning to see how much more we could see.  I adore the Art Institute, but it is so huge that I feel bad about how little time I end up really looking at the paintings and sculpture.  By the time we walked back to the train station I was footsore and weary to the bone.  Good practice for Italy.

2 comments:

laura said...

I feel the same way about the Metropolitan in NYC--so much to see, but it's so exhausting I feel I need to make concentrated strikes!
I love your sketches and applaud you for making them. I hope I will have the nerve to follow your example when I go U of Pa's museum next week!

Ann said...

Wonderful sketches! I loved hearing about your day at the art institute. It has been many years since I was in Chicago but I get to travel "virtually" by way of your blog!