The Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum attracts young children and weary caregivers — and us. The Butterfly Haven alone is worth the cost of admission, but we also love visiting the Beecher Collections Laboratory and related exhibits, and I adore the “Heritage of the Chicago Academy of Sciences” room. Although smaller, “Frogs: A Chorus of Color” actually gives the Shedd’s “Amphibians” a run for its money. (Note that “Frogs” closes on January 22.)
Category Archives: museums
Abbreviated
Afternoons end before they have really begun now, don’t they? By 3 p.m., I must turn on a light here and another there. Abbreviated days possess a sort of magic, especially when the snow finally arrives. But by early January, I suspect that, as in years past, the long nights will begin to weary me, and I will sniff the air for the scent of warm, clean dirt. Spring.
❧
I took the image above during a recent trip to the Museum of Science and Industry. The adventure was equal parts sentiment and foolhardiness. After all, who goes to MSI on the day before Thanksgiving? Everyone, as it turns out. And the trip into the city took twice as long as it should have. Still, we had a lovely time and plan to return for a proper visit (i.e., one that coincides with everyone else returning to work and school) over our long winter break.
After MSI and dinner, we browsed the wondrous stacks at the Seminary Coop Bookstores and then attended Electra at the Court Theatre. The Court’s Greek Cycle has met with somewhat mixed reviews, but we have appreciated all of it — particularly Sandra Marquez’s majestic Clytemnestra (all three plays) and Kate Fry’s Electra.
Apart from getting the band back together, the trip into Chicago for MSI and Electra was the highlight of our recent ten-day break. Our daughters, now juniors, use the Thanksgiving holiday to get ahead on final projects and examinations, so when they came up for air, we kept it pretty simple. We (re)watched some Sherlock (in anticipation of Season 4) and walked. We raked leaves and counted birds at the feeders. We ate good food and talked. They had appointments for haircuts and annual physicals. Otherwise, they were absorbed by their studies. Soon they will be home again, though, with no projects or exams looming large. We have assembled a much more ambitious itinerary for our winter break, then, including four plays, four museums, the postponed zoo trip, and some eagle-watching.
In early December, while they finish up their fall courses and enter their reading and examination period, I will work through some holiday music and Unit 4 in Rubank Advanced Method, Vol. 1. I have been studying flute for just over two years now and will (again) acknowledge that while I have made tremendous strides, some skills may be beyond me, including velocity. Young learners have a decided advantage when it comes to manual dexterity and speed, to be sure, but the pursuit remains worthwhile and stimulating. Other pursuits for these next two weeks include reading, of course; Project FeederWatch, which now offers an option to report behavioral data (displacement and predation); and my volunteer work at the library, which I don’t think I have mentioned previously. My husband and I gave several hours each week a few summers ago but stepped away from the commitment to focus on our literacy volunteer assignment. I returned to the library in September and am enjoying the people and projects.
Until my next post, here are three more images from our MSI visit, which included a stop at the “Brick by Brick” exhibit.
“Do not talk to motorman.”
The above images were taken at the Illinois Railway Museum on what may have been the last cool, breezy day in Summer 2016.
Mental geography
The following images were taken during the Member Preview of the Art Institute’s “America after the Fall: Painting in the 1930s,” which runs through September 18.
■ O. Louis Guglielmi’s “Phoenix (Portrait in the Desert: Lenin)” (1935)
■ Grant Wood’s “Death on Ridge Road” (1935)
■ O. Louis Guglielmi’s “Mental Geography” (1938)
At the Field Museum
China’s First Emperor and His Terracotta Warriors runs through January 8, 2017, at the Field Museum.
At the John G. Shedd Aquarium
“This time it’s just simply my bedroom…”
I took the images above at the Art Institute’s “Van Gogh’s Bedrooms” exhibit, which runs through May 10.
■ “Parisian Novels” (1887)
■ “A Pair of Shows” (1887)
■ A letter to Theo
■ An early sketch of the bedroom from a letter to Theo
■ “Self-Portrait” (1889)
■ “A Corner of the Asylum and the Garden with a Heavy, Sawed-Off Tree” (1889)
■ “Thatched-Roofed Cottages of Jorgus” (1890)
■ “Hospital at Saint-Rémy” (1889)
The Oriental Institute
First Folio
The Illinois stop for the First Folio! tour is not the Newberry Library, as one might have guessed, or any of Chicago’s wonderful museums or the state’s colleges or universities. No, “The Book That Gave Us Shakespeare” can be seen at the Lake County Discovery Museum through February 28. Opened to Hamlet’s “To be or not to be” soliloquy, the Folio reposes in a display case, which is, in turn, behind a display pane. The effect is a bit like birdwatching through the picture window with binoculars: twice-removed. And while good reasons for the ultra dim lighting must exist, I have grown old: It was beyond difficult to see the Folio. I have, however, decided to focus on the fact that I stood in (approximately) the same room with the bible of the secular religion that is bardolatry, and that, dear readers, was wildly cool.
Field trip
For twenty years, I have mostly avoided visiting the museum campus during spring and winter breaks and summer camp days, but scheduling constraints dictated that the winter holiday was the most convenient time for an all-day visit. Oh, the noise, noise, NOISE! Still, the Field Museum is such an amazing place that I nearly put the pressing crowds out of mind, particularly when wandering exhibits like the Gidwitz Hall of Birds and the Cyrus Tang Hall of China. The following images were captured in “The Greeks: Agamemnon to Alexander the Great” and the Cyrus Tang Hall of China.
Nerdishly 