Statue at the north entrance to the Palace of Fine Arts

Did the Art Institute of Chicago lions come from the 1893 World’s Fair? (Pt 1)

The pair of lion sculptures by Edward Kemeys that stand in front of the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC) are not cast from sculptures at the 1893 World’s Fair. This misinformation, which appears to have originated in the late 1980s, now permeates descriptions of these iconic Chicago mascots in institutional, popular, and scholarly sources. A set of sixteen lion sculptures stood at the entrances to the Palace of Fine Arts at the World’s Columbian Exposition (WCE), and numerous contemporary sources credit their authorship to A. Phimister Proctor and Theodore Baur (not Kemeys). More importantly, the designs of Kemeys’ AIC lions clearly do not match any of the WCE lions.

Autumn 2019 Trivia Question

Our seasonal newsletter includes a “Palmer Puzzler” exclusive to those who subscribe. (You can sign up here.) The first person to send us the correct answer wins a small prize. The Autumn 2019 Trivia Question Which famous world leader stood motionless on the fairgrounds of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition pointing at the New York State Building? We had several interesting guesses--Teddy Roosevelt (who was at the Fair), George Washington, and Winston Churchill, and one correct answer: Augustus Julius [...]

By |2022-09-02T08:10:50-05:00October 8th, 2019|Categories: TRIVIA|Tags: , , |0 Comments
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