“Pictures from an Exposition: Visualizing the 1893 World’s Fair” has opened at the Newberry Library.

“Pictures from an Exposition: Visualizing the 1893 World’s Fair” has opened at the Newberry Library in Chicago.

The exhibition of nearly two hundred items from the World’s Columbian Exposition fills two galleries in the Library’s newly renovated main floor. Displays are organized into sections on:

• Introduction
• Construction
• Maps and Bird’s Eye Views
• Staff and Sculpture
• Publicity and Promotion
• Spectacle
• Transportation and Tourism
• Columbus and Commerce
• Along the Midway Plaisance
• Indians
• Nations and States
• Art and Decoration
• Photography
• Making History

“Pictures from an Exposition: Visualizing the 1893 World’s Fair”

The 125-year-old treasures on display are in remarkably good condition. Vibrant color prints and paper ephemera, clean books and broadsides, and gorgeous artwork fill display cases and wall space. After spending well over an hour poring over the informative descriptions of the objects, we knew we would be coming back many more times to enjoy these rarities.

Displayed on the west wall of the gallery is an oil sketch by William Dodge of his mural for the dome of the Administration Building, The Glorification of the Arts and Sciences, which we wrote about here and here.

William Dodge’s The Glorification of the Arts and Sciences.

The redesigned Newberry book shop carries many books about the 1893 World’s Fair as well as original Columbian Exposition postcards published by the Library. We only wish there was an exhibit catalog to accompany the exhibit.

Here is a selection of what you can see at “Pictures from an Exposition: Visualizing the 1893 World’s Fair”:

Photography at the Fair.

Maps and Bird’s Eye Views of the Fair.

A Ferris Wheel postcard display.

A Ferris Wheel print.

Making History at the 1893 World’s Fair.

Sheet music from the 1893 World’s Fair.

The White City.

Shown below are some interesting details that you may be able to find in your visit to “Pictures from an Exposition: Visualizing the 1893 World’s Fair”:

Detail from The Colonnade, Fisheries Building by Peter Woltze.

Details from a souvenir fan of the 1893 World’s Fair, showing the water craft on the lagoon.

Detail from Charles Mente’s Fete on the Wooded Island.

Detail from an advertisement for Hagenbeck’s Zoological Arena on the Midway.

Detail from an 1893 World’s Fair playing card, showing the Michigan State Building.

Chief Simon Pokagon’s publication The Red Man’s Greeting, 1492-1892, printed on birch bark. The original title was intended to be The Red Man’s Rebuke, consistent with his message that the Native Americans “have no spirit to celebrate … the great Columbian Fair.”

A passage from the diary of Theodora Sturkow Ryder, who recorded that “the Japanese Island [sic] is the prettiest spot in the Fair, as far as flowers and grounds are concerned, and when it is finished (there is that objectionable phrase again) it will be an earthly paradise.”

Detail from The Dream City (American Fine Art Company, 1893).