The Art Institute of Chicago

This museum was one of the top, if not THE top, “must-see” places on the results that came up when I searched “top things to do in Chicago.” I would have gone without a second thought if it were just me, but I wasn’t sure if my other friends would be down to visit an art museum on our (way too) short 3-day trip. However, my inner dork rejoiced when they were game! 🙂

Impressionism

The first things that I wanted to see were pieces in the famous impressionism gallery.

Freaking out!! This museum has so many of Degas’s ballet dancer paintings!

Going along with the ballet theme…

I especially liked the conductor’s hands in just the bottom corner. Is he conducting the ballerina, or is she moving to the music?

One of my favorite subjects to look at – the sea. Such pleasing colors; so perfect.

And here it is, the main piece I was looking for:

“A Sunday on La Grande Jatte” – Georges Seurat

I still remember learning about this painting and liking its pointillism style from a humanities class that I took in 10th grade. 10th grade! Clearly it had made an impression (ha!) on me!

This next one was equally exciting! I talked about how I periodically took pictures of the sunset over the NYC skyline in my Fourth of July post. Now, I got to see the Claude Monet wheatstack paintings that varied from time of day to season to year in person.

Got to see the real deal, at a place I least expected (I thought they’d be in the Louvre or something).

Just for good measure, here’s more Monet. The man’s a genius.

Waterlilies

Vetheuil (in France)

Even more famous art…I also saw a Van Gogh. I previously learned about this painting somewhere, about how it made a breakthrough in perspective and dimension, blahblah. I was just happy to be close enough to touch it see the paint strokes on it.

“The Bedroom” – Van Gogh

American Folk Art

Odd yet amusing piece seen on the way to the European gallery:

I found the buggy eyes and short necks to be really funny! Instead of portraits, these people looked like cartoon characters.

European Art before 1900

I came to this gallery just to see the middle painting.

“The Assumption of the Virgin” – El Greco

Once again, I learned about it somewhere but couldn’t remember where. But I was reminded of what a sneaky/clever man El Greco was when I read he “proudly attached his signature in Greek at the lower right.”

Sure enough, there it was:

“Domenikos Theotokopoulos, Cretan, displayed this 1577”

Modern Art

We had time for one last gallery, and we chose Modern Art.

With a Pollock!

Heh, the security guy told us a funny story about this one. They were all brought into the room for the briefing and told to not touch, lean, or sit on the art.

“Where’s the art?” he asked.

“You’re leaning on it.”

Shakes my head at modern art.

But modern art, you quickly redeemed yourself! This piece was so fun! I love interactive art! All these strands of hanging plastic reminded me of spaghetti.

Our recreation of Gerhard Richter’s “Woman Descending the Staircase” cracks me up!

I decided I liked Richter’s work.

“Ice” by Gerhard Richter

With the Chairman:

“Mao” – Andy Warhol

I was so pleased that they had a few pieces by Salvador Dali here! He’s one of my favorite artists, and I was surprised that The Met didn’t have many of his works when I visited over the summer.

Also, did you know that Dali made sculptures? I sure didn’t until I saw this:

Rofl wtf?

You also can’t go wrong with a few Mondrians. Chicago art museum, you’re winning me over.

Finally, we saw last two “famous” paintings according to the suggested “what to see in an hour” list on the back of the visitor guide. We cheated a little, I know.

I actually didn’t like this painting. Meh.

And one of my favorite Picasso’s blue period paintings, “The Old Guitarist:”

“Is it weird that I’m smiling next to this sad painting?” “No. Now let me take your picture.”

I was quite impressed by the Art Institute of Chicago. As always, I wished that I had more time to spend in any art museum. I’m sure there were a ton of cool things in there that I would’ve been delighted to see.

Have you been to the Art Institute of Chicago? What are your suggestions for me to see next time?

(Special thanks to Liz for taking photos of me!)

Thanks for reading!

P.S. Like art museums? You may also want to read: An Afternoon at MoMA, The Met, Part 1, The Met, Part 2, Museum of Arts and Design (MAD)