While in Chicago for the family reunions and genealogical research, we stayed in a Days Inn in Lakeview, the old neighbourhood (where I lived for a time way back in ... never mind). I wandered around and found a bunch of faces and gargoyles I never noticed when I lived there. But of course, I lived there before my gargoyle awakening.
They're everywhere! I don't know what these buildings were originally - I'd research them if I weren't working on another book - but they were highly decorated.
Ivy clinging to walls looks all scholarly and academic, but it can be destructive when its roots worm their way into fissures in the stone.
So I was shocked and concerned when I saw that many of the sculptures on Ryerson University's Kerr Hall were completely obscured by ivy when I led a Heritage Toronto walking tour there on Sunday, based on Faces on Places, my book about Toronto's architectural sculpture.
The ivy was much, much thicker than is seen in this picture, shot in 2005. The sculpture pictured here is of a javelin thrower by Elizabeth Wyn Wood. She was one of four leading Canadian sculptors of the mid-20th century (the others were Dora de Pédery-Hunt, Jacobine Jones and Thomas Bowie) who were chosen to decorate Kerr Hall when it was built in the early 1960s with sculptures representing the aims of an institute of higher learning in the heart of a city.
Ryerson president Sheldon Levy has made no secret of the fact that he'd like to see Kerr Hall torn down. He's been saying that since before the university's "master plan" was released, envisioning greater integration of the campus into downtown Toronto.
That was four years ago, and Kerr Hall is still standing. Is it Ryerson's apparent ambivalence about Kerr Hall that has resulted in this inaction? For the sake of the sculptures, which surely will be saved if Kerr Hall is demolished, the ivy should be removed and any necessary repairs or cleaning undertaken. Several people on the tour, unprompted by me, voiced that opinion, which I hope they will communicate to the university.
Speaking of opinions, researchers in Oxford, England, are investigating whether ivy is actually damaging, or whether it plays a "bioprotective role ... on the surface of historical buildings and structures as an agent of thermal and moisture regulation."
Hmmmmm... With all the gargoyles and whatnot in Oxford, you'd think they would know. But over on this side of the pond, Yale University - an actual Ivy League school - has been waging a war on the vines for some time.
My visits to Chicago cemeteries were largely to find and record the gravestones of distant and not-so-distant relatives, all of whom had pretty unexceptional stones. But I noticed a few that I thought worth taking the time to shoot. And of course, the most striking sculptures would have to be the ones marking the graves of children...
This one (left) was for a whole section of the cemetery labelled "Lullabyland," where mostly young children were buried. I don't know who created it or why a child staring down a lamb was thought to be appropriate, but I do like the look of determination on the girl's face.
This one (right), which seemed to cry out to be rendered in black and white, marked the grave of a girl named Lauretta who died at the age of seven in 1898.
The cemetery where we had no relatives at all and as a result had only 15 minutes for a quick drive-through was Graceland Cemetery where anybody who was anybody in Chicago history is buried. I'd like to take a tour of the place the next time I'm in Chicago, to see the graves of the notables and some of the fantastic sculpture there. The only figure I had time to snap (and from inside the car at that) was "Eternal Silence" by Lorado Taft which watches over the grave of Dexter Graves (yes, that's his name), one of the city's first settlers. This figure is also known as the "Statue of Death," and originally was entirely black, except for the face, hidden in the hood of the robe. Legend has it that if you look into the face you will glimpse your own death. But legend also has it that the figure is impossible to photograph, and that cameras won't function in its presence. It certainly is eerie, but obviously, photographable.
Note to Pamela Williams: Your cemetery sculpture gig is secure!
I have just returned from a family reunion in Chicago. Actually, not having ever heard of these relatives, let alone met them, I suppose it was more of a union than a reunion. Part of the trip involved going through cemeteries and shooting family monuments (and interesting cemetery sculpture, following the lead of Pamela Williams - see links; results will be posted shortly).
We noticed a couple of bucks wandering through one cemetery, eating the flowers and whatnot, and spent about 20 minutes following and shooting... I mean, photographing them.
Yes, the first pic (top) was shot through the car windshield, but then I got out and followed them around:
Sorry for the long absence, folks. The day job and numerous other responsibilities have occupied all of my waking hours over the last year. (Has it been that long?!) But I'm back now.
NEWS: See the sidebar (right) for an upcoming Faces on Places-themed walking tour, and a link to a chapter of my forthcoming biography of Merle Foster.
We lost Mary Travers yesterday. (If the name doesn't ring a bell, she was the "Mary" of Peter, Paul & Mary.) She was diagnosed with leukemia several years ago, and underwent chemotherapy which allowed her to have a life-saving bone marrow transplant. Unfortunately, it was the side effects of the chemotherapy that killed her.
I saw PP&M several times—although only after they'd split up and then got back together again. Every concert was memorable.
They came in for a lot of criticism from "real" folk singers for having homogenized harmonies and too precise tempos, but their voices blended beautifully and their political and social beliefs literally resonated in their music.
They also came in for some criticism, especially after they got back together in 1978, for being anachronistic, part of a long-ago faded fad. But as Mary said during one concert, "Folk music is not a fad because you [the audience] are not a fad."
But they helped make history. They were invited by Martin Luther King Jr. to sing at the 1963 March on Washington, where he delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech and they sang "Blowin' in the Wind" and "If I Had a Hammer."
Probably the most memorable PP&M concert I attended was in the early 1980s at the old Ontario Place Forum. The Forum was an outdoor venue with seating under its roof for about 3,000, and surrounding grassy hillsides that comfortably accommodated another 8,000 (although some rock concerts drew audiences of more than 20,000). The stage was 20.4 metres in diameter and rotated the full 360° every hour. Rain was forecast for this night, and many people sat on the hills in the drizzle. But then it really began to pour, and the masses moved down to try to at least stand under the roof. Instead, Mary invited as many as would fit to sit on the stage. I don't know how many people wound up sitting on the stage, but it looked pretty cozy. I don't know how the Ontario Place management felt about it, but it was a generous thing to do.
photo credit: Sally Farr
So hammer on, Mary. Keep an eye on us — we still need you.
photo credit: Barry Feinstein
One of my favourite PP&M songs is "Day is Done," which this clips shows them singing for a not-terribly enthusiastic Japanese audience in 1990:
One other note: this Sunday is the 25th anniversary of the death of Steve Goodman, the Chicago folkie who wrote "The City of New Orleans," among other songs you've almost certainly heard. He died of leukemia in 1984. Below is a picture I took of Steve—funnily enough, at the Ontario Place Forum in 1978—which my friend Clay Eals used in Facing the Music, his 2007 biography of Goodman.
These figures—from the cast of characters of newspaper newsrooms of old (i.e., even before I started my career)—were cast from the originals on the Calgary Herald Building that was demolished in 1972.
This trio is now located on the Alberta Hotel building on Stephen Avenue, but originally the Southams (then owners of the Herald) commissioned Royal Doulton in the U.K. to design and make 44 figures and masks for the exterior of the newspaper building.
According to information on a Calgary Public Library website, the gargoyles were the work of sculptor Mark Villars Marshall (1879 - 1912), who died shortly after the gargoyles were installed in 1912. Marshall had been a stone carver working on Victorian Gothic Revival churches before he went to work at Royal Doulton's Lambeth Studios in the late 1870s.
At the time of demolition, the Herald building was known as the Greyhound Building, and the gargoyles were scattered, including to other buildings including the Calgary Convention Centre and the University of Calgary.
