Morning Becomes Chicago

Chicago at Dawn — The River District Skyline

When Mary and I were last in Chicago, we stayed at the Renaissance overlooking the river, the Marina City Towers (known as the Corncobs), the IBM Plaza, the Trump Tower, the Wrigley Building and all sorts of points in between. If you have any fondness for Chicago or architecture—and I love both—it’s a marvelous view. We’ve got a lot of pieces from this visit, and a few from this 15th floor vista. This is one of them.

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From the same river at the opposite end of the day: Occidens — Second City's second-tallest skyscraper and the last western light on the Chicago River.

Also from Chicago's riverfront, the same building in a very different light: the Wrigley Building seen through the eyes of its 1920 architect.

From the same city, a more contemplative light: light through the lead glass of Rockefeller Chapel, University of Chicago.

From the same river, a different darkness: Batman Meets Ingmar Bergman — Chicago's cityscape of dread and aspiration.

Provenance: Leica M11 • Voigtlander 15mm

Fine Art Chicago Cityscape Print

Titled Sicut Ante Lucem—“as before the light”—this scene began just before dawn, buildings and streets still lit for the receding night, with the light tinted mauve by an October sun through a hazy sky intruding on an inky midnight blue sky. This is a big image suitable for a large wall print. It will be available soon in both our Fine Art Gallery. Enjoy!

Dawn glows over Chicago's River Walk District skyscrapers.
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Morning Becomes Chicago

From the fifteenth floor of the Renaissance Hotel, the Chicago River bends through its architectural corridor in a thirty-second exposure that turns the predawn waterway into a ribbon of light — Marina City's twin corncob towers to the right, Trump Tower and the Wrigley Building beyond, Mies van der Rohe's IBM Building as a cool dark rectangle amid the warmth. Greg titled this image "Sicut Ante Lucem" — as before light — a name that describes the exact quality of a sky that has not yet decided between night and dawn. This panorama required a fifteen-floor vantage point that few photographers can access, and the thirty-second exposure demanded a sky that would hold still long enough to resolve. Chicago at this hour feels earned.

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