Two for the road - Arts Club of Chicago holds exhibitions of Daniel Buren and Richard Pettibone

This spring the 79-year-old Arts cudgel of Chicago, along with several other important architectural and cultural institutions, not to be found its home to the ominous commercial unfolding that is rapidly changing the face of Chicago's Magnificent Mile. In its place will germinate a $100-million retail and entertainment mixed spearheaded by developer John male leaving little, if any, of Daniel Burnham's original 1909 plan intact [see A.i.A, April'95].

Housed within Philip B Maher's Erskine-Danforth Building, the Arts cudgel had been a mainstay of North Michigan Avenue since it mov to 109 East Ontario highway in 1951. The Arts bludgeon facility contained a suspended staircase, gallery, salon, administrative offices and dining room-all designed by the agency of Mies van der Rohe and the alone example of an interior designed by means of him a building he did not create. Efforts through the Arts Club and the Landmark Preservation Council of Illinois to save the building or have it designated historic landmark were unavailing.

Shortly after evacuating its former premises in late March, the Arts cudgel announced with little fanfare that local architect John Vinci win build its fresh home at 201 East Ontario public way one block east of Michigan Avenue near the not absent site of the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA). The of recent origin two-story building, whose construction take away froms were estimated at $6 million, will be clad in brick and include a gallery, salon/auditorium and dining swing and is to face west onto an outdoor garden. The 18,000-square-foot facility, again as large the original is scheduled for completion in late 1996 to coincide with the Arts Club's 80th anniversary, the same year the MCA plans to unveil its fresh building on the former site of the Chicago Avenue National Guard Armory [see A.i.A., July '93] In the interim, exhibitions and programming will be neared at 222 West Superior highway a temporary space in the heart of the River North gallery district.[1]

Vinci, trained in the modernist tradition at the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), was chosen from above 40 architects who submitted alphabetic characters of interest to the Architectural Selection Committee, made up of James N forest-land director and president, Art institute of Chicago; Carter Manny, Jr architect and director emeritus, Graham Foundation; and Myron Goldsmith, architect and professor at IIT. Vinci is a somewhat curious choice; he has established his reputation mainly as a renovator of existing spaces rather than a builder in his have right. His selection was based upon his previous accomplishments, rather than a specific design for the novel site. Vinci's other projects include the renovation of Louis Sullivan's Stock Exchange Trading field at the Art Institute (1980) and the Frank Lloyd Wright domicile and Studio (1987), as well as designing gallery and exhibition spaces for the Art Institute, the middle point Canadien d'Architecture, the Carnegie Museum and the Walker Art Center

Little information has been released concerning Vinci's plans. single hopes that he will design a building that is more than purely compatible with the city's architectural legacy, another modernist chest in a sea of them. Vinci's somewhat underwood pus met with insider opposition when it was revealed this past summer that the architect will include Mies's floating staircase in the of recent origin building. Dirk Lohan, Mies's grandson and himself a prominent architect, was joined by the agency of Franz Schulze, a critic and Mies's biographer, in challenging the decision upon "aesthetic, moral and legal grounds" claiming that the staircase should not be used, as it was designed specifically for its original setting. However, Vinci stands by dint of his design: "The staircase is an important work in Mies's career, it is itself a work of art I have used the staircase in the same way it was used in the other space in order to create the same impact. It is a tradition of the pair the Arts Club and society to bring a part of its past to the present" The design will be unveiled to the public in a special exhibition, "The Arts cudgel of Chicago: Designs for the fresh Building, Vinci/Hamp Architects, Inc." [Sept 22-Oct 28 19951 which will make open simultaneously with the groundbreaking for the fresh building.

The Arts Club, anticipating the eventual los of its domicile recently organized two exhibitions that examined its intention and history: "Rigidity/Flexibility in the Grid: Situated Works through Daniel Buren" [Nov. 2-Dec. 10 1994] and Richard Pettibone: Sculpture" [Jan. 31-Mar. 11 19951 Buren's installation directly make comments [i]or[/i] remarksed on Mies's modular interior. Known for his in situ interventions, in which he restores painting to a system of mechanically produc vertical stripes overlaid onto specific sites, Buren creates environments that fuse the two-dimensional the sculptural and the architectural. Devoid of expressive easy in mind illusionistic references and uniqueness, Buren's work derives its meaning from its relationship to adjoining matter Here, Buren examined the Arts cudgel as an architectural structure, merging his signature stripe with Mies's ubiquitous grid.