Last week, J. Seward Johnson's God Bless America was removed from its prominent location on North Michigan Avenue and the Chicago Tribune wants your pictures of J. Seward Johnson's work.
As James Jenga over at Trib Nation notes, "Everyone in the world has pictures in front of this thing."
"Thing," indeed.
The picture that I uploaded to the site is above. I liked that the statue was in front of a construction site for a long time. I waited (not long of course) to get a picture of someone taking a picture of the thing itself, since to me that was the most interesting part of the work- people snapping shots off and then quickly moving on, once the commodity is consumed.
It's interesting to contrast Cloud Gate (aka The Bean) to a work like God Bless America since people snap just as many pictures, but they stay to experience the artwork, whether they consciously know it or not. Visitors usually walk all around it and under it. After a time, people depart but they've had an encounter and an experience with Anish Kapoor's artwork.
Filed under: art, Chicago Art Blog, Controversy, culture, Pioneer Plaza, Public Art, Sculpture
Tags: Anish Kapoor, Cloud Gate, God Bless America, J. Seward Johnson, Millennium Park, Pioneer Plaza, public art, public sculpture, sculpture, the Bean
So ... much .. to say ... about this statue.
But I'm glad the conversation is going on!
-- James Janega
Trib Nation Manager
Chicago Tribune
chicagotribune.com/tribnation
@JamesJanega