My Wright Eye – September 6, 2024

Posted on September 6, 2024 by Mark Hertzberg

I have just finished helping lead my 17th Road Scholar Frank Lloyd Wright tour. The number is important because it speaks to my challenge to try to find something different to photograph each time I visit a familiar Wright commission. I look for something other than a literal building photo. Here is what I found this week at some of the buildings. They are shown in the order in which we visited the Wisconsin buildings in this Illinois / Wisconsin tour (a link to the itinerary is at the end of the post):

Looking up at the adjoining eaves of two Burnham Block duplexes, Milwaukee:

Burnham Duplexes 9.5.24 001.jpg

Looking up stairway from the basement, Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church

Annunication Greek Orthodox Church 9.5.24 001.jpg

The roof of the Unitarian Meeting House, Madison, from across the parking lot:

Wyoming Valley School, Spring Green:

Wyoming Valley School 9.6.24 001.jpg

Reflections of east classroom windows in the west classroom window:

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Wyoming Valley School 9.6.24 008.jpg The reflections were visible only when I was seated at a desk, and disappeared when I stood

Assembly Hall, Wyoming Valley School:

Entrance Hall, Wyoming Valley School:

Private dining room, Riverview Terrace Restaurant

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Drafting Room at Hillside:

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Outside the drafting room:

Romeo and Juliet Windmill, as the weather changed:

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Road Scholar Wright Tour:

https://www.roadscholar.org/find-an-adventure/22976/Architectural-Masterworks-of-Frank-Lloyd-Wright

Please scroll down to read previous articles on this website.

Wright’s Birthday: Wright in the Abstract

Posted on June 8, 2024 by Mark Hertzberg

Photos © Mark Hertzberg (2024)

LR Frank Lloyd Wright in Racine.jpg SC Johnson Administration Building, Racine (1936)

It is June 8, Frank Lloyd Wright’s 157th birthday. Social media sites devoted to Wright are abuzz every year with birthday tributes. Sometimes I have something to post on “the day,” but not always. (June 8, 1968 or 6.8.68, my high school graduation day, is more significant to me personally, but that’s another story). I had nothing in mind to post this year until I took my customary morning bike ride and passed his Thomas P. Hardy House and the SC Johnson Administration Building and Research Tower which are on my bike route in Racine. I thought back to the fall of 2022 when my alma mater, Lake Forest (Illinois) College, honored me with a 50th anniversary Homecoming dual photo exhibit. One gallery was devoted to my career as a photojournalist, the other to my Wright-related photography. As I pedaled down Main Street this morning I decided to share the latter with you. The thesis of the exhibit was to present “Wright in the Abstract,” rather than only in record shots or head-on photos of his work. My challenge was to cull a few dozen photos of several thousand. The photos are in chronological order, based on the year of the commission, not the year of completion.

Romeo and Juliet Windmill, Spring Green (originally 1896, rebuilt 1938 and 1992):

LR Romeo and Juliet 1.23.22 006.jpg

Thomas P. Hardy House, Racine (1904-1905):

LR 1319 Gene + 10 007.jpg

Meyer May House, Grand Rapids (1908):

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LR Meyer May House 105.jpg

Hollyhock House, Los Angeles (1917):

LR Hollyhock House 10.3.19 019.jpg

Taliesin III, Spring Green (1925):

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LR Taliesin 1.23.22 029.jpg

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Tour guests in Wright’s bedroom at Taliesin III:

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Hillside Drafting Room, Spring Green (1932):

LR Hillside Drafting Room 5.20.22 017.jpg

SC Johnson Administration Building (1936) and Research Tower (1943-1944):

LR Adm Bldg Tower 2010 016.jpg

LR SCJ Admin. Building 2015 028.jpg

LR Adm. Bldg. Furniture Jun 2012 027a.jpg

LR Glass Dome 2017 002.jpg

LR Glass Dome Sept4.07 014.jpg

Herbert F. Johnson Jr. Home (Wingspread), Wind Point (1937):

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Florida Southern College, Lakeland (Beginning in 1938):

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SC Johnson Research Tower, Racine (1943-44):

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LR Tower Fall Sun.jpg

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Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (1943):

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Price Tower, Bartlesville (1952):

LR Price Tower a Sunrise 005.jpg

LR Price Tower Reflection 005.jpg

LR Price Tower Misc. Details 062.jpg

Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church, Wauwatosa (1956):

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LR AGOC 6.16.22 060.jpg

LR AGOC Interiors 9.17.19 011.jpg

Lindholm Service Station, Cloquet, Minnesota (1957):

LR Lindholm Service Station 6.7.21 020.jpg

Marin County, California, Civic Center (1957):

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I will close with a photo I took just a few weeks ago when I was given the opportunity to preview the newly-restored Hillside Theater (1952), which is being inaugurated this evening, literally just as I am putting this piece together:

LR Frank Lloyd Wright Hillside Theater Restoration 028.jpg

People have often asked me what attracts me to Wright’s work. As a photographer, I have a visual attraction to his work. That grew in part out of my newspaper photo assignments at the SC Johnson Administration Building. But beyond that, as I began to study his work, I was struck by the evolution of his designs from the 1890s until his death in 1959. Happy birthday, Frank Lloyd Wright, and thank you for your contributions to helping us reimagine the spaces in which we live, work, and worship.

Please scroll down in http://www.wrightinracine.com for previous posts

Waking Up My Wright Eye

Posted on October 20, 2023 by Mark Hertzberg

My Wright eye has been dormant for a long time. It finally woke up today, as I finish my 13th Road Scholar Frank Lloyd Wright Wisconsin tour as their step-on guide and “expert lecturer.” I generally look for photos other than just literal pictures of Wright’s work.

I join the tours when they get to Racine from Chicago on Wednesday, and continue with them in Milwaukee, Madison, and Spring Green through Saturday morning. It is always a challenge to find fresh photos at places I have visited so many times, especially when each stop is always at the same time of day. This time I took no photos Wednesday or Thursday. It took spectacular fall colors today – Friday – when we got to the Unitarian Meeting House in Madison to bring my camera back to life.

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Then it was on to Jacobs 1. The bonus for our tour guests, which we did not tell them about in advance, was that there was a good chance that Jim Dennis, steward of the house since the 1980s as well as Bill Martinelli would greet us, and that Jim would welcome them into his home:

My first picture at the Taliesin estate after lunch was not of a Wright building…it was of the trees in front of Hillside Home School:

LR Hillside 10.20.23.jpg

I found new angles for photos of the drafting studio, including the sadly empty drafting room and the Romeo and Juliet windmill:

LR Romeo and Juliet 10.20.23.jpg

And then it was on to the Holy Grail for our guests, Taliesin itself:

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If you know me well enough you know that I cannot go to Taliesin without a visit to our dear friend Minerva Montooth. Today was no exception:

Links:

The Road Scholar trip:

https://www.roadscholar.org/find-an-adventure/22976/architectural-masterworks-of-frank-lloyd-wright

Unitarian Meeting House:

https://fusmadison.org/welcome/meeting-house/

Taliesin:

https://www.taliesinpreservation.org

Minerva Montooth:

https://wrightinracine.wordpress.com/2021/09/29/the-marvelous-minerva-montooth/

Please continue to scroll down for previous posts.

Wright in the Abstract

Posted on October 18, 2022 by Mark Hertzberg

Photos © Mark Hertzberg (2022)

I had to edit 34,575 Frank Lloyd Wright building images (or 185.62 GB) down to 30 photos for an exhibit.

Here’s the backstory: Lake Forest (Illinois) College, my alma mater, honored me with two concurrent exhibits this month for my 50th anniversary Homecoming. Rebecca Goldberg, Lecturer in Art and Director of the Gallery in the Romanesque Durand Art Institute building, initially asked me just to include a handful of my Frank Lloyd Wright work in an exhibit of my career in photojournalism. I found it hard to edit the Wright work down to just four or so photos. Fortunately there was enough space in two galleries to mount two separate exhibits, each with 30 prints. I decided to pick mostly abstract interpretations of Wright’s work than show perhaps predictable building photos. My selection is below, in alphabetical order of the commissions:

LR Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church (1956) .jpg Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church, Wauwatosa, Wisconsin, 1956

LR Florida Southern College (1938) .jpg Florida Southern College, Lakeland, Florida, 1938

LR Florida Southern College (1938).jpg Florida Southern College, Lakeland, Florida, 1938

LR Guggenheim Museum (1943).jpg Guggenheim Museum, New York City, 1943

LR Hillside Drafting Studio (ca. 1933).jpg Hillside Drafting Room, Taliesin, Spring Green, Wisconsin, 1933

LR Hollyhock House (1919).jpg Hollyhock House, Los Angeles, 1919

LR Imperial Hotel (1915).jpg Imperial Hotel entry way, Tokyo, 1915, as rebuilt at Meiji Mura near Nagoya, Japan

LR Lindholm Service Station (1956).jpg Lindholm Service Station, Cloquet, Minnesota, 1956

LR Marin County Civic Center (1957) .jpg Marin County Civic Center, San Rafael, California, 1957

LR Marin County Civic Center (1957).jpg Marin County Civic Center, San Rafael, California, 1957

LR Meyer May House (1908) .jpg Meyer May House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1908

LR Meyer May House (1908).jpg Meyer May House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1908

LR Price Tower (1956) .jpg Price Tower, Bartlesville, Oklahoma, 1952

LR Price Tower (1956).jpg Price Tower, Bartlesville, Oklahoma, 1952

LR Romeo and Julie Windmill (1898).jpg Romeo and Juliet Windmill, Taliesin, Spring Green, Wisconsin, 1898

LR SC Johnson Administration Building (1936).jpg SC Johnson Administration Building, Racine, Wisconsin, 1936

LR SC Johnson Addition (1943-44).jpg SC Johnson Administration Building, Racine, Wisconsin, 1936

LR SC Johnson Administration Building (1936) .jpg

SC Johnson Administration Building, Racine, Wisconsin, 1936

LR SC Johnson Research Tower (1943-44) .jpg SC Johnson Research Tower, Racine, Wisconsin, 1943/44

LR Taliesin (1911, 1925) .jpg Taliesin, Spring Green, Wisconsin, 1911, 1925

LR Taliesin (1911, 1925).jpg Taliesin, Spring Green, Wisconsin, 1911, 1925

LR Taliesin Visitors (1911, 1925).jpg Taliesin, Spring Green, Wisconsin, 1911, 1925

LR Thomas P. Hardy House (1904-05).jpg Thomas P. Hardy House, Racine, Wisconsin, 1904/05

LR Wingspread (1937) .jpg Wingspread, Wind Point, Wisconsin, 1937

LR Wingspread (1937).jpg Wingspread, Wind Point, Wisconsin, 1937

Now, as for those 34,575 images…if I had time to go through them, a good chunk could be deleted. But who has time to do that?

Hours for the gallery…the show runs through October 30:

https://www.lakeforest.edu/academics/majors-and-minors/art-and-art-history/art-galleries

Keep scrolling down for previous posts on the website…

A Winter Day at Taliesin

Posted on January 27, 2022 by Mark Hertzberg

All photos © Mark Hertzberg (2022)

I have been to Taliesin countless times, but never in winter, until Sunday when we had a lunch date with our friend, Minerva Montooth. It had snowed overnight. We would not be able to get to Spring Green until Noon, so there would be no photos in the morning’s “golden light.” I fared better in that respect in the late afternoon. But in between, at Noon, there was a rich, rich blue sky.

Taliesin 1.23.22 025.jpg

Except for this first photo, I am taking you on a tour of Taliesin in the order I photographed the estate. Get comfortable, there are lots of photos. and you will see how my day’s take evolved. The first stop was a drive through the Visitor’s Center or Riverview Terrace. First, this establishing shot, and then a few details that caught my eye:

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Then onto Hillside, to enter the estate from that end…but I found that the driveway is closed for winter. No matter. I saw these views of Midway Barn and Romeo and Juliet windmill on the road to Hillside. The towers are vertical punctuation marks to the horizontal composition of Midway:

Midway Barn Romeo and Juliet 1.23.22 001.jpg

Midway Barn Romeo and Juliet 1.23.22 002.jpg

I played with different ways to photograph Romeo and Juliet and Tan-y-Deri as we approached the driveway to Taliesin:

Romeo and Juliet Tan-y-Deri 1.23.22 001.jpg

Romeo and Juliet Tan-y-Deri 1.23.22 002.jpg

Romeo and Juliet Tan-y-Deri 1.23.22 004.jpg

The house as seen from the approach did not photograph well at midday, but I took record shots. I wish there was more snow on the hill below the birdwalk:

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I was happier with what I saw from below the house, starting with the lead photo in this piece.

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I am a photojournalist. As we say in our circles, after you find a photo, you “work it.” I have to thank John Clouse again for offering to sell me his 200-500mm lens at a good price last summer. While a newspaper colleague of mine in the early 1980s – before today’s fine zoom lenses – once said that “The best telephoto lens is your feet,” (i.e., walk toward and away from your subject rather than rely on the lens), this lens was especially welcome on a cold day after a fresh snowfall. I thought of the countless treks through the estate that the incomparable Pedro Guerrero made when he took his many memorable black and white winter photographs of Taliesin. What would he have done in color, or would he have stayed with black and white, which he printed so beautifully?

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The bird walk is an extraordinary cantilever:

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Caroline Hamblen was returning from feeding her chickens in the apple orchard as I crested the hill:

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Then it was time to park and explore on foot:

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The next photo is at Minerva’s front door:

Taliesin 1.23.22 067.jpg

I saw this on my way in:

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I saw this on my way out after lunch and lively conversation:

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Then, one more swing through the estate with magic light at the “golden hour”:

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Farewell, Taliesin, until next time!

Tan-y-Deri Porch Restored

Posted on June 10, 2017 by Mark Hertzberg

Tan-y-Deri 2017 002.jpg

Completion of the multi-year comprehensive restoration of Tan-y-Deri was celebrated last Friday with a ribbon-cutting ceremony as a start to Taliesin’s celebration of Frank Lloyd Wright’s 150th birthday. The three organizations charged with maintaining the legacy of Frank Lloyd Wright at Taliesin celebrated their collaboration on this project: Taliesin Preservation, the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, and the School of Architecture at Taliesin. The porch, perhaps better referred to as a terrace since it is only accessible from the interior, was the final piece of the project. It has been reconstructed to how it looked between 1939 – 1956. I had an opportunity Saturday to photograph the first floor of the house before the Wright birthday dinner. The Romeo and Juliet Windmill is nearby, and is in some photos. The early evening light, at the end a rainy day, was particularly welcome and lovely that day. We had driven to Taliesin under cloudy skies, and I had been pessimistic about having good light for photos.

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Wright designed the house in 1907 for Jane and Andrew Porter, his sister and brother-in-law, four years before designing Taliesin. The name of the house is Welsh for “under the oaks.” Andrew Porter was then the business manager for the nearby Hillside Home and School, run by Wright’s aunts. Tan-y-Deri 2017 010.jpg Tan-y-Deri 2017 017.jpg