Architectural Drawirigs at The Art Institute of Chicago

The Department of Architecture at the Art Institute of Chicago

In 1912 the renowned architect and planner Daniel H. Burnham bequeathed $50,000 to the Art Institute of Chicago to establish an architectural library. The first Burnham Library of Architecture (fig. 1), designed by Howard Van Doren Shaw, opened in 1919. Its collec­tions grew rapidly, so much so that the library moved ten years later to a new space (fig. 2) designed by Earl H. Reed, Jr., Hubert Burnham, and William J. Smith. The balcony of this two-level room was used for an active exhibition program on architecture in the 1930s. Exhibits organized by the Burnham Library included the Chicago War Memorial Competition, the work of Holabird and Root, the collection of Louis Sullivan sketches and memorabilia donated by George Grant Elmslie, and the first American one-man exhibition of the work of Bauhaus master Mies van der Rohe. This room was later designated the A. Montgomery Ward Gallery after the Burnham Library merged its collec­tions with those of the Ryerson Library of Art in new stack addition.s completed between 1966 and 1968 by the .architectural firms C. F. Murphy Associates and Brenner, Danforth, and Rockwell . It was then that Thomas Bee by, a young architect with C. F. Murphy, suggested that the space surrounding the Ryerson Library reading room at the clerestory level be con­verted into an architecture gallery (fig. 3).

Fig. 1. Howard Van Doren Shaw, Burnham Library of Architec­ture, the Art Institute of Chicago, 1919. Frederic Clay Bartlett, History of the Skyscraper, fresco secco, 1920/21.

Fig. 2. Earl H. Reed, Jr., Hubert Burnham, and William J. Smith, Study room, Burnham Library of Archit ecture, the Art Institute of Chicago, 1929.

Fig. 3. C. F. Murphy Associates, Proposed remodeling and a ddition to the Ryerson and Burnham Libraries, interior perspective cross section, 1965. Delineated by Thomas Bee by. Ink and pencil on tracing paper, 66 x 77.3 cm . Gift of Thomas Bee by, 1981.

The design of the new gallery was meant to highlight the views into the Ryerson Library's elaborately de­tailed reading room, designed by Shepley, Rutan and Coolidge in 1901, as much as the objects placed within the gallery-drawings from the extensive collection of architect's designs that had been acquired since the library was founded. From 1968 until 1978, the gallery held a semipermanent display of these designs. Then, in 1979, a series of changing exhibitions was imple­mented. Entitled Chicago Architects , these shows were intended to reveal the wealth of drawings in the Art Institute's collection by many different Chicago architects, some dating back to the fire of 1871, and not just works by Chicago School greats such as Wil­liam Le Baron Jenney, Louis Sullivan, and John Wellborn Root. Two such installations in 1979 and 1981, funded by the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, prompted numerous dona­tions of similar architectural drawings by current Chi­cago architects. These two exhibitions, along with a third mounted in 1982, have been synthesized in a re­cently published handbook to the museum's perma­nent collection entitled Chicago Architects Design. This third installation and book constitute the first major project of the Art Institute's new curatorial De­partment of Architecture, established September 16, 1981. The department has as its base the important collection of architectural drawings collected by the Burnham Library of Architecture. The department's goal is to collect the best drawings by Chicago archi­tects, as well as designs by architects outside Chicago for projects in this region, and to make these works accessible to the public through further exhibitions and publications.

The Types and Styles of Architectural Drawings

The 40,000 architectural drawings in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago span more than a century and represent a great range of types, purposes, and styles. Because their materials are fugitive by nature and their function is primarily practical, most archi­tectural drawings simply do not survive their initial use. Those that have found their way into museums or archival collections, moreover, have been tradition­ally considered as either tools of instruction or curi­osities. Yet, where they have been preserved, studied, and exhibited, as happens increasingly today, they provide the kind of information about an architect's intentions and aesthetic concerns that a constructed building, or photographs or written descriptions of it, simply cannot. Only in drawings do we witness those initial ideas that provide insight into the creative proc­ess. Only through a series of developmental draw­ings can we trace the evolution of design or study the changes imposed through compromises with a client, subsequent additions, or remodeling. Ranging from scrawled notations to complex legal documents, ar­chitectural drawings present a stylistic and technical history reflecting the philosophies of larger move­ments.

The earliest drawings in the Art Institute's collection date from the 1870s, a time of enormous change in ar­chitectural design and building technology. In Chi­cago, especially, the massive rebuilding that followed the devastating fire of 1871 offered unlimited oppor­tunities and attracted a host of architects and engi­neers. As Chicago and other American cities grew rapidly and as advances in construction permitted the rise of tall commercial structures, large architec­tural offices, such as Burnham and Root in Chicago or McKim, Mead and White in New York, found that they had to become more systematized in order to handle major commissions. Firms established a hier­archical division of labor so that designers , draftsmen, and engineers each tended to specific aspects of a building's design and construction. This pragmatic ap­proach-which replaced the age-old atelier arrange­ment in which apprentices gained experience in all aspects of design- was errcouraged as well by changes in the education of architects. By the 1880s the system of training through apprenticeship was being replaced by a formal, academic education in architecture and engineering at such prestigious schools as the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris and the Massachusetts Insti­tute of Technology in Cambridge.

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Fig. 4. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Preliminary sketch for a house, c. 1934. Ink on paper, 30.2 x 21 cm. Anonymous gift, 1981.

The systematiza tion of design required a regularized process for planning and executing a building that in­volved many of the types of drawings to be discussed here, including preliminary sketches; developmental drawings , made during the evolution of a design; pre­sentation drawings, used for showing the proposed design to a client, or perhaps for publication or exhi­bition; working drawings . from which blueprints are made ; and finally, recording drawings, made of the finished building to document its appearance for posterity.

Even though a preliminary design is , ordinarily, loosely drawn and can even resemble architectural shorthand, this stage is particularly important because the process of conceptualization begins here. Like the thought it records, it is fragmentary in nature, an arti­fact borrowed or invented to be elaborated upon later. Such is the case with Mies van der Rohe's sketch for a house (fig. 4) . Because preliminary drawings are frequently done quite spontaneously, they can pos­sess a freshness of spirit and can reveal more about an architect's inspiration and procedure than can any other kind of drawing. The spontaneity of these draw­ings, however, can also mean that they often appear on unusual types of support- such as envelopes, sta­tionery, or the back of any available surface.

As the design process continues, the principal archi­tect or his or her assistants may make countless devel­opmental drawings to refine or alter an idea. Shee ts of this type are identified as preparatory studies or de­velopmental drawings . They all share a tentativeness and a flexibility reflecting the intermediate nature of this stage, during which initial ideas are clarified, competing notions examined, and problems resolved. James Edwin Quinn's developmental drawing for a penthouse at 1500 North Lake Shore (fig. 5) is one of dozens of such drawings in the Art Institute's collec­tion which record the entire process of the design of this project. Developmental sketches are usually done

Fig. 5. James Edwin Quinn, Developmental drawing of the east elevation of a penthouse apartment for George Woodruff, 1500 North Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, c. 1927. Pencil and craypas on tracing paper, approximately 50 x 109.5 cm. Gift of James Edwin Quinn, 1980.

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on tracing paper. Its transparency allows an architect to build from previous sketches by retracing desired elements and editing out features that are no longer wanted. As tracings are sketched, erased, and redrawn and new ideas are laid over previous ones, the sheet can achieve a subtle pentimento effect. Ironically, the fragility and impermanence of the highly acidic trac­ing paper underscores the fact that these drawings, and by extension the ideas they reflect, are only part of a process, not necessarily its end result.

The next step for the architect is to propose his ideas to the client through presentation drawings, such as Laurence Booth's drawing for an4!.partment building at 320 North Michigan Avenue (fig. 6). Usually in the form of plans, elevations, or perspectives, presenta­tion drawings are often beautifully executed by other architects in the firm or by independent delineators in order to win the client's approval ; they may also be prepared for publication or exhibition.

After the proportions, dimensions, and details of a building have been finalized, the architectural office executes a set of working drawings, which represent the architect 's final thoughts before construction. It is at this point that a shift in emphasis occurs from the drawings to the building itself. As their name suggests, working drawings are functional, employing symbols, riotations, and a legend to present information about dimensions and materials. In the museum's collection is a set of working drawings for the Montgomery Ward Building designed by Richard E. Schmidt (fig. 7). In the early 19th century, working drawings were done in ink on paper and were copied by tracing each line of the original drawing with a spiked wheel. The holes in the paper were then pounced with a bag of colored chalk, thereby transferring the image onto the sheet below. From the 1880s through most of the 20th century, working drawings were executed on linen, a hardy support that accounts for the survival of so many of them. Today, architects usually work on Mylar, an equally sturdy synthetic material.

Working drawings usually take the form of plans, sec­tions, elevations, and Construction detailing. A plan is a horizontal slice through a building revealing the ar­rangement and spatial relationships of rooms, walls, and other features. One plan is needed for each floor. A section is a vertical slice through a building show­ing the relationship of one floor to another, as well as

Fig: 6 . . Laurence Booth, Apartment building in context, 320 North Michigan Avenue ,' Chicago, 1981. Drawn by Laurence Booth and Max Underwood. Ink on Mylar, 137 x 137 cm. Anonymous gift, 1981.

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Richard E. Schmidt, Plan of vestibule for Montgomery Ward Building, 6 North Michigan Avenue, Chicago, 1899 (now greatly altered). Ink and pencil on linen, 46.7 x 76.2 cm. Gift of Schmidt, Garden and Erikson, 1977.

those of stairwells, lightwells, and other features that cut through the building vertically. In an elevation the interior or exterior walls of a building appear as flat­tened planes. In this way, windows, doors, cornices, and other projecting details are flattened and shown in exact relation to one another.

Before the w!despread use of photographic reproduc­tion at the end of the 19th century, architects or their clients, upon completion of a project, would commis­sion recording drawings. With their emphasis on color and atmosphere, recording drawings often resemble those done for presentation. Gradually, architects turned to the camera to record the completion of a project and publish it in architectural journals.

Although the main purpose of architectural drawings is to create a building, not all drawings lead to con­struction. In fact, an important group of drawings

. deals only with concepts: these can be student works, travel sketches for later reference, or polemical draw­ings. Student·drawings frequently reveal more about prevailing academic trends than they do about the in­sights of their maker. In the late 19th century an archi­tect who received a Beaux-Arts training learned the importance of producing beautiful, meticulously ren­dered drawings with a classical, heroic vocabulary of domes, allegorical statuary, colonnades, pedimented

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Fig. 8. Richard Yoshijiro Mine, Student design for a proposed war memorial in Illinois, 1921. Ink and wash on paper, 54.6 x 93.9 cm. Gift of Richard Yoshijiro Mine, 1979.

porticoes, and sweeping staircases. The Beaux-Arts style of Richard Yoshijiro Mine's war memorial (fig.

,. 8) certainly gives no indication of this architect's fu­ture direction, but rather indicates his training, since Beaux-Arts philosophies continued to dominate ar­chitectural education in America throughout the 1920s and '30s.

The second group of conceptual drawings are sketches that record ideas: notations made while reading, im­pressions of buildings or locations seen while travel­ing, or projections of worlds other than our own, i.e., fantasy sketches. Travel sketches like William Augus­tus Otis's study of the chateau at La Clayette (fig. 9) can tell us a great deal about an architect's concerns and tastes . Otis's interest in the elements of Roma­nesque architecture, for example, surfaced in his later work. The fantasy sketch, on the other hand, is rooted in the w-0rk of the late 18th-century French visionary architects Claude Nicolas Ledoux, Etienne Louis Boullee, and Jean Jacques Lequeu, whose drawings expressed utopian ideas without regard to their struc­tural and economic feasibility. Clearly within this vein is Stanley Tigerman's Fantasy Temple (fig. 10).

A third type of conceptual exercise is the polemical drawing, in which an architect explains or defends a philosophical premise that is in opposition to current

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Fig. 9. William A. Otis, Travel sketch of chateau at La Clayette, Saone et Loire, 1880. Ink on paper, 22.3 x 31 cm. Gift of William Augustus Otis, 1922.

trends. Undoubtedly, the greatest practitioner of the polemical drawing was the 18th-century Roman artist Giambattista Piranesi , whose archeological recon­structions and drawings of hypothetical prisons were, in fact, criticisms of prevailing architectural prac­tice. Twentieth-century practitioners of the polemi­cal drawing include Louis Sullivan and Frank Lloyd Wright. Sullivan's System of Architectural Ornament, an important set of drawings (see front panel) deline­ating his philosophy of decoration that he intended for publication, is in the Art Institute's collection.

The Art Institute of Chicago has collected all these types of architectural drawings for several reasons. First, architectural drawings are unique objects of art revealing the creative workings of an architect's imag­ination (a~ well as the inner workings of his or her office). On an aesthetic level, they are visually engag­ing, while their media and styles of delineation often reflect larger trends in contemporary art, and their forms and imagery reflect the concerns of contempo­rary architecture. Unlike other art forms. architectural drawings also have an important historic component in that they document another art form-buildings. The richness and variety of information that architec­tural drawings bring to our knowledge of culture make them significant and valued resources.

Fig. 10. Stanley Tigerrnan, Fantasy Temple, 1980. Ink and prisma­color on paper, 14 x 21 cm. Auxiliary Board Architectural Drawing Fund, 1981.

Architectural publications by the Art Institute of Chicago

Chicago Architects Design: A Century of Architec­tural Drawings from The Art Institute of Chicago. 1982. The first handbook to the museum's collection includes essays on the history of the collection, the types and styles of architectural drawings, and the conservation of drawings, as well as biographies of and selected works by 85 architects or architectural firms . 174 pp. 9 color plates; 165 black and white illustrations.

Edward H. Bennett: Architect and City Planner, 1874-1954 by Joan E. Draper. 1982. This exhibition catalogue includes a major essay on the career of one of Chicago's most important city planners. 64 pp. 54

· black and white illustrations.

Walter Burley Griffin, Marion Mahony Griffin: Architectural Drawings in the Burnham Library of Architecture. 1981. An illustrated checklist of an exhi­bition presenting some of the beautiful orientalesque drawings of this husband and wife architectural team. 16 pp. 13 black and white illustrations.

P. B. Wight: Architect, Contractor, and Critic, 1838-1925 by Sarah Bradford Landau. 1981. An exhibition catalogue eovering the work of this New York and Chicago architect, best remembered for introducing the Ruskinian Gothic style to America. Includes com­plete checklists of Wight's writings, buildings, and proj ects. 108 pp. 8 color plates; 75 black and white illustrations.

Architectural Records in Chicago: A Guide to Archi­tectural Research Resources in Cook County and Vicinity by Kathleen Roy Cummings. 1981. A guide to over 100 collections of architectural records in libraries, museums, historical societies, and govern­ment offices in the Chicago area. This volume is de­signed to help architectural researchers locate hard-to-find records that may be useful in recon­structing the history of buildings in this area. 92 pp. 26 black and white illustratl ons.

Architecture in Context: 360 North Michigan Avenue. 1981 . This exhibition brochure discusses Alfred S. Alschuler's London Guarantee and Accident Com­pany Building (1923; now Stone Container Building) in relation to its site and the 1909 Plan of Chicago. 8 pp. 13 black and white illustrations.

The Plan of Chicago: 1909-1979. 1979. This exhibition catalogue documents the drawings done for Daniel H. Burnham's renowned Chicago Plan of 1909 which are in the Art Institute's collection and in other insti­tutional holdings. Three essays summarize the Plan and its impact on Chicago and supply an in-depth analysis of the creation, functions, and techniques of the images published within the Plan. 52 pp. 86 black and white illustrations.

These volumes and others on architecture are avail­able in the Museum Store of the Art Institute. Further questions about the Department of Architecture can be directed to the curator at the Art Institute of Chi­cago, Michigan Avenue at Adams Street, Chicago, Illinois 60603 (tel. 312-443-3949).

This publication was funded by the Illinois Humanities Council, with assistance from the National Endowment for the Humanities

Front panel. Louis Sullivan, Plate no . 17 from A System of Architec­tural Ornament According with a Philosophy of Man's Powers, 1922. Pencil on Strathmore paper, 57.7 x 73.5 cm.

© 1983 by The Art Institute of Chicago

Designed by Michael Glass Design, Inc., Chicago, Illinois