Hardy at Sunrise / Photo Workshop

© Mark Hertzberg (2025)

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 161.JPEG

Why in the blazes would I set the alarm for 6 a.m. on a Saturday a week ago? Really, why? We are in the midst of moving (after 47 years!) and sleeping in would have been swell. So, yeah, well, why? To help Andrew Pielage who was conducting one of his photo workshops in Racine.

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 016.JPEG Andrew had 18 photo guests arriving shortly after 7 a.m. to photograph Frank Lloyd Wright’s Thomas P. Hardy house inside and out, top to bottom. Andrew had asked me a year ago to tell the photographers about Hardy and about the house. Tom Szymczak, the steward of the house, had two kringle and a pot of hot coffee waiting. I got there at 6:48 a.m. Before I could get the goodies out and turn on the lights, I had to take my own photos of the house at sunrise. So, first my photos, and then my photos of the photographers.

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 162.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 164.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 170.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 169.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 177.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 171.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 172.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 175.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 178.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 186.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 188.JPEG

Hardy Sunrise 10.25.25 189.JPEG

People sometimes ask my about what brand of camera is best. My answer is that the photographer’s eye is more important than the nameplate. I use Nikons because I am looked into their lens system. I have long carried a new go-to camera in my pocket…my smartphone. I recently upgraded to the iPhone 17 Pro. My friend Harvey Riekoff asked me what I thought of the camera…all the photos in this post were taken with the phone. It makes me think of cartoonist Aaron Johnson’ What the Duck t-shirt that I was given a few years ago: “Your camera takes great pictures!” To which the duck answered, “Your mouth makes nice compliments!” And, now photos of Andrew’s guests:

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 004.JPEG

 

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 008.JPEG

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 006.JPEG

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 009.JPEG

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 010.JPEG

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 011.JPEG

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 012.JPEG

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 020.JPEG

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 021.JPEG

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 022.JPEG

(My wife has a collection of photos of me on my back taking photos in Wright homes and other historic sites…I had to take this photo!)

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 024.JPEG

Hardy Pielage 10.25.25 025.JPEG

For more information about Andrew Pielage’s Photo Workshops;

https://www.apizm.com/events-calendar

Please scroll down to read previous posts on this website.

 

 

Wright Book Beat, Fall 2025

© Mark Hertzberg (2025)

We are previewing four new books about Frank Lloyd Wright and his architecture. Two were recently published. The other two might be on your wish list for next year. (Disclaimer: I have photographs in the Hansen and Rovang books, and am consulting on the Hardy House section of the Lubell / Pielage book)

In alphabetical order, by author:

Ken DahlinFrank Lloyd Wright and the Path to BeautyScreenshot 2025-09-08 at 2.59.54 PM.png

Dahlin, a Racine native, is the award-winning architect who is the founder of Genesis Architecture in Racine. The book is part of the “Routledge Research in Architecture” series. As previewed by Routledge: “This book connects Frank Lloyd Wright’s organic theory with his pursuit of beauty, presenting a path for the recovery of beauty in architecture…”

Dahlin recently spoke at Wright in Wisconsin’s event at Taliesin and signed books at the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy’s conference in Pittsburgh. His work is the cover feature of the current issue of the Journal of Architecture + Design (see link below).

LR Dahlin BC.jpg

Screenshot 2025-09-10 at 3.01.57 PM.png

Kristine Hansen: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Illinois

This book will be a sequel to Hansen’s successful 2023 book Frank Lloyd Wright’s WisconsinHow America’s Most Famous Architect Found Inspiration in His Home State which went into three printings.

Screenshot 2025-09-08 at 4.28.00 PM.png

The Illinois book, whose subtitle has not been determined yet, is expected to be published next July or August. Wisconsin is a slim paperback that through photographs and narratives explores Wright’s work in his native state. It is described as “is part travel guide, part fireside chat with stewards of his designs.” Globe Pequot is the publisher of both books.

LR Hansen.jpgHansen at her book talk at Boswell Books in Milwaukee, June 9, 2023.

Sam Lubell and Andrew Pielage: 50 Houses

Rizzoli will be publishing this book by architectural writer Sam Lubell and Wright and architectural photographer Andrew Pielage. A press release previews the book as a project that “will delve into the stories of 50 of Frank Lloyd Wright’s most iconic designs…(it) will uncover the rich and distinctive narratives that make each house as remarkable as its design.” The book is more than just another architectural and historic survey of these properties as it “celebrates Wright’s enduring legacy and the human experiences” of the houses. One of the 50 houses is the Thomas P. Hardy House in Racine, which I have long been familiar with. Lubell and I had a long conversation about the house in the living room a month ago. Pielage was given the privilege of staying there overnight so he could photograph it at different times of the day, evening, and night:

Frank Lloyd Wright Photographer 004.JPG

Frank Lloyd Wright Photographer 003.JPG

Sarah Rovang: Through the Long Desert – Georgia O’Keeffe and Frank Lloyd Wright:

LR ThroughtheLongDesert.jpg

Rovang’s book had its genesis eight years ago in a “why not?” moment when she attended a panel discussion in Santa Fe with Stuart Graff, then President and CEO of the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, and Cody Hartley, Director of the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum,  about similarities between the two artists. Someone in the audience suggested that there should be a book about them, because they knew each other. After a week of pondering the idea, she emailed Graff and Hartley that she would want to be the author. Rovang will be at the October 23 “Sunsets & Sips” at Taliesin West:

https://franklloydwright.org/sunsets-sips/

I can relate to the “why not?” moment. I am often asked how I started on the path to being commissioned to write and photograph first one book, and ultimately four, about Wright and his work in Southeast Wisconsin. It’s a convoluted tale, that started with a “why not?” moment. Bravo, Sarah, for following through on that moment!

Links:

Dahlin’s book website, with discount coupon (the book lists for $152):

https://www.routledge.com/Frank-Lloyd-Wright-and-the-Path-to-Beauty/Dahlin/p/book/9781032620053?srsltid=AfmBOopoF7ZSGIZC6IbNLkzliB53hBd1nLevv3ShpW0sQQzL4M8G6apy

Genesis Architecture:

https://www.genesisarchitecture.com

OA + D Journal:

https://oadarchives.bigcartel.com/product/journal-oad-v13n2

Routledge Research in Architecture Series:

https://www.routledge.com/Routledge-Research-in-Architecture/book-series/RRARCH

Hansen’s book:

https://www.globepequot.com/9781493069149/frank-lloyd-wrights-wisconsin/

Sam Lubell’s website:

https://www.samlubell.com

Andrew Pielage’s website:

https://www.apizm.com

I urge you to purchase books directly from the publisher or from a local bookseller rather than reflexively ordering from “The Big A.” Even if Amazon will save you money, we need to support our local bookshops.

Please scroll down for earlier articles on this website.

Hardy Reflections and Shadow Play 8.5.25

Photos © Mark Hertzberg (2025)

Hardy Shadow Play 8.5.25 001.JPEGOne of the entry way hallway windows is reflected in the two story living room windows that overlook Lake Michigan.

One of the aspects of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Thomas P. Hardy House that continually fascinates me is the shadow play from the seven windows in the entry hallway. I had the opportunity to have fun with the reflections and shadow play again when I met at the house with Sam Lubell yesterday. Lubell and photographer Andrew Pielage are working on a book about 50 Wright homes for Rizzoli (more about that in a future post).

Hardy Shadow Play 8.5.25 003.JPEG

As Robert McCarter has pointed out, the floor plan of the house is delineated in white in the windows: the square in the middle represents the public areas, the two story living room and the dining room one floor below. When I lead tours of the house I remind the guests that the only computer Wright had when he came up with such designs was the one between his ears.

Hardy Shadow Play 8.5.25 004.JPEG

The rectangle that bisects the square represents the bedrooms at either end of the two main floors. We now add to the drama of the seven Wright-designed windows the leaded glass inserts in the two sliding entry doors (one north, one south). They replicate the design of Wright’s living room windows, which were taken out by the second stewards of the house (1938 – 1947) because they leaked. They were replaced by clear windows.

Hardy Shadow Play 8.5.25 006.JPEG

Hardy Shadow Play 8.5.25 007.JPEG

Hardy Shadow Play 8.5.25 008.JPEG

Hardy Shadow Play 8.5.25 009.JPEG

Hardy Shadow Play 8.5.25 010.JPEG

Hardy Shadow Play 8.5.25 011.JPEG

These quick happy snaps were taken with my phone camera…elapsed time, except for the top photo, seven minutes. Every time I turned I saw another photo. Thank you Gene and Tom and Joan Szymczak, for rehabilitating the house for us to enjoy!

Scroll down for previous posts on this website

Hardy House Views: 1904 – 2025

© Mark Hertzberg (2025)

Today I had the rare (and arguably unfortunate) opportunity to photograph Frank Lloyd Wright’s Thomas P. Hardy House in Racine, Wisconsin from the lake, without getting wet. Climate change is playing havoc with Lake Michigan (as it is with the world). In 2020, the water level was so high that the stewards of the house, and neighbors, had massive hunks of stone brought in to protect their property:

IMG_5706.jpg

Today, well, I was able to walk out onto what had been part of the lake:

LR Hardy Below 2.9.25 008a.jpg

The photograph below, taken through the two story living room windows, shows how much the water has receded:

LR Hardy Below 2.9.25 029.jpg

Taking my photographs today gave me the idea to show this view of the house through the years, in historic drawings and photos. First, we have Marion Mahony’s drawing, reproduced in House Beautiful magazine’s 1906 story about the house:

House Beautiful 2.jpg© 2025 Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, AZ. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York)

Then we have the earliest known photograph of the house, taken in 1906, as it neared completion:

Terrace 0506.004 raw.jpg

A 1908 photograph from the OA + D archives, shows significant growth of trees on the hill:

LR 1908 Hardy HIll.jpg

The dining room terrace, which ended in a stucco wall, was demolished after World War II at the behest of the Sporers, second stewards of the house. There was a public beach, the 14th Street Beach, just south of the house (to the left of it in these drawings and photographs, until the 1970s. The Sporers asked Wright to give them a recreation room under the dining room terrace. Edgar Tafel sketched plans on Mahony’s drawing before leaving the Taliesin Fellowship in 1941. The work was not done until after the war. Full-length windows, including a door, opened to the outside:

Terrace sketch PPT.jpg© 2025 Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, AZ. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York), from Jim and Margaret Yoghourtjian’s collection

Next, is from David Archer’s collection. He grew up in the house between 1947 – 1957:

Archer Terrace 14.jpg

Schuyler and Peterkin Seward were stewards of the house from 1957 – 1963:

Seward Beach.jpg

Jim and Margaret Yoghourtjian were the final stewards (1968 – 2012) before the late Gene Szymczak who bought, and rehabilitated the house in 2012. Margaret took these photos:

LR Below hill horiz 2.jpg

LR Below hill main.jpg

The beach was lost in the 1970s when the City of Racine closed off a breakwater across from the house. Jim Yoghourtjian told me that they lost about 125 feet of property when the lake filled in below the house. While the Yoghourtjians used to share the house with interested parties, as they sensed people were taking them for granted and not respecting that they lived in a private home, rather than a public site, they let the landscape grow wild, to shield them from boaters on the lake and people walking the lakeshore:

LR Landscape Before 001.jpg

LR Landscape Before 004.jpg

A week after buying the house, Szymczak had the hill cleared:

LR Tree cutting 010.jpg

LR Tree cutting 047.jpg

And that, brings us to today:

LR Hardy Below 2.9.25 024.jpg

LR Hardy Below 2.9.25 011.jpg

There is no telling what the lake will do next.

 

 

The Coda to Hardy House Rehabilitation

© Mark Hertzberg (2024)

Hardy Exteriors Post-Restoration 079.jpg

When the late Eugene (Gene) Szymczak considered buying Frank Lloyd Wright’s Thomas P. Hardy House in Racine, Wisconsin in 2012 he told me, “I don’t have children. This is something [save the house] I could do for Racine.” Indeed he did. He undertook a heroic rehabilitation and stabilization of the house.* Gene, left of center in the photo below, was awarded the prestigious Wright Spirit Award by the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy  for his work on the house in 2015. He died unexpectedly a year later after an illness.

BC 2015 WSA All 003.jpg

The house stayed in the family after Gene’s death. Tom Szymczak is one of Gene’s brothers. Tom recently completed a project which, he told me, was the last thing Gene wanted to accomplish at the house. The house was built with two pocket doors. They were replaced by conventional, hinged plain wood doors by the third stewards of the house, David and Mary Archer, between 1947 and 1957:

South door 003.jpg

Gene decided to put pocket doors back in the house in 2013. He chose sliding glass patio-style doors so he could look into the two courtyards from the entry hall. The heavy metal arms that opened and closed the pocket doors were left in place, and were found in 2013:

Pocket Doors 010.jpg

Pocket Doors 004.jpg

Pocket Doors 014.jpg

The house was built with leaded glass windows throughout, including in the dramatic two-story living room overlooking Lake Michigan. Anne Ruetz, whose parents were second stewards of the house (1938 – 1947) told me her parents replaced the windows with plain glass ones because the original ones leaked. When Gene put in energy efficient windows he jokingly told me that the next owners of the house could bear the expense of replicating Wright’s window design. Little did he know, of course, that he would be shifting the burden to his brother. 1908 photographs, which are used courtesy of the OA + D Archives, show the original leaded glass living room windows:

LR 1908 Hardy HIll Crop.jpg

LR 1908 Hardy HIll.jpg

LR 1908 Hardy Side.jpg

LR 1908 Hardy Side Crop.jpg

Instead of replicating the design in the living room, Gene intended to have the design fashioned for the pocket doors. The work was completed earlier this month, with window inserts made by Oakbrook Esser of Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. The installation photos show Tom Szymczak, left, and master craftsman Chad Nichols:

IMG_8036.jpeg

IMG_8039.jpeg

IMG_8030.jpeg

DSC_0043.JPG

DSC_0035.JPG

IMG_8025.jpeg

IMG_8041.jpeg

DSC_0017.JPG

DSC_0021.JPG

Thank you, Gene, for your gift to our community and to the World of Wright!

BC 2015 WSA Szymczak.jpg

The first people outside of family and friends to see the new windows will be 17 members of a Road Scholar Wright tour next Wednesday. They will be followed by several hundred people attending Wright in Wisconsin’s “Wright and Like” tour Saturday September 7.

*The term “rehabilitation” is appropriate, rather than “restoration,” because there were some changes to the house. “Restoration” would infer house museum status, accurate to either the day Hardy moved into the house (1906) or left it (in 1938) after losing it at sheriff’s auction because of monies owed on the house.

Links:

Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy:

www.savewright.org

Wright and Like Tour:

https://wrightinwisconsin.org/wright-and-2024

Road Scholar Architectural Masterworks of Frank Lloyd Wright Tour (run 4 or 5 a year)

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

Please scroll down to read previous posts

Windows on Main Street

© Mark Hertzberg (2024)

I have written before that I always challenge myself to see something new even on my umpteenth visit to a given Frank Lloyd Wright – designed building. I was blasé today as I took my friend Robert Hartmann on a tour of the Thomas P. Hardy House on Main Street in Racine, Wisconsin, as he prepared for Wright in Wisconsin’s forthcoming “Wright and Like” tour scheduled for September 7. Hartmann expects between 300 – 500 guests and wanted to figure out the best way for guests to wind through the compact house, and how many docents he would need.

The light was less than spectacular and there was nothing new to see. I had biked to the house so my only camera was my smartphone. I think phone cameras sometimes oversaturate colors, but that camera was all I had when I unexpectedly saw this in the second floor windows above the south stairs:

Wright Windows 001.jpg

Wright Windows 002.jpg

So much for being blasé!

Here is a link for more information about the tour:

https://wrightinwisconsin.org/wright-and-2024

I served on Wright in Wisconsin’s board for 14 years. They are the only statewide Wright group, originally founded in cooperation with the state Department of Tourism to promote Wright tourism in Wisconsin.

Please scroll down for previous articles or blog posts.

Wright’s Birthday: Wright in the Abstract

Photos © Mark Hertzberg (2024)

LR Frank Lloyd Wright in Racine.jpgSC 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):

LR Meyer May House 054.jpg

LR Meyer May House 105.jpg

Hollyhock House, Los Angeles (1917):

LR Hollyhock House 10.3.19 019.jpg

Taliesin III, Spring Green (1925):

LR Taliesin 1.23.22 026.jpg

LR Taliesin 1.23.22 029.jpg

LR Taliesin 1.23.22 073.jpg

LR Taliesin.jpg

LR Taliesin 5.15.19 001.jpg

LR Taliesin 6.8.19 025.jpg

Tour guests in Wright’s bedroom at Taliesin III:

LR Taliesin Tour.jpg

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):

LR Clerestory Sun 013.jpg

LR Wingspread Aerial 6.16.21 011.jpg

Florida Southern College, Lakeland (Beginning in 1938):

LR Esplanades 067.jpg

LR Esplanades 094.jpg

LR Esplanades 086.jpg

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

LR Tower framed 009.jpg

LR Tower Fall Sun.jpg

LR SC Johnson Admin Building Tower 6.16.20 003.jpg

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

LR Guggenheim Museum 2017 025.jpg

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):

LR AGOC 6.16.22 048.jpg

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):

LR Marin County 2015 007.jpg

LR Marin County 2015 055.jpg

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

 

My Wright Eye – May 2024

Photos © Mark Hertzberg (2024)

I had a half hour wait before meeting 22 guests coming from coast-to-coast to Frank Lloyd Wright’s Thomas P. Hardy House on their weeklong Road Scholar tour (I am with the group as a Road Scholar guide for three days on these tours, as they travel through Racine, Milwaukee, Madison, and Spring Green). I have been in the house countless times, including leading 14 of these tours. While I try to see something new on every visit to a familiar Wright design, I did not think there was anything new to see in the house.  I had already played Wordle and my other daily games phone games. I had already looked at my emails. I plopped down in a chair in the living room and looked up. I looked up some more and then I knew what I had to do…I had to lie down on the floor and start taking pictures of the ceiling.

IMG_7080.jpeg

IMG_7079.jpeg

IMG_7076.jpeg

Then I walked over to the stairs and looked up at the second floor:

IMG_7087.jpeg

When I then went outside to greet the bus, I saw reflections of Wright’s leaded glass front hallway windows and their reflected images in a new way:

DSC_5985a.jpg

IMG_7083.jpeg

Today, as our guests toured Wright’s American System-Built duplex at 2132/34 W. Burnham Street in Milwaukee, I looked down instead of up. The duplex is being restored with help from a Save Americas Treasures grant. These are the back stairs:

IMG_7103.jpeg

On-line links:

Road Scholar’s “Architectural Masterworks of Frank Lloyd Wright tour:

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

Frank Lloyd Wright’s Burnham Block:

http://wrightinmilwaukee.com

Please continue to scroll down to view and read previous posts

Hardy: Light, Shapes, Shadows

Photos © Mark Hertzberg (2023)

One of my favorite things in Frank Lloyd Wright’s Thomas P. Hardy House (1904/05) in Racine, Wisconsin, is the bank of seven windows in the front hall. I am taken both by the design – Robert McCarter has written that the floor plan of the house is articulated in white* – but particularly how the shadow of the pattern is projected into, and around, the front hall by the afternoon sun.

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 005.jpg

The first photo, below, is a file photo of one of the original windows (the windows have since been replicated and replaced). It was protected from vandals, who had previously thrown stones at it, by a layer of plastic. Next, are photos of the patterns I was delighted to find yesterday afternoon when I stopped to drop something off at the house.

Floor Plan Window.jpg

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 001.jpg

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 002.jpg

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 003.jpg

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 006.jpg

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 007.jpg

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 008.jpg

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 009.jpg

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 010.jpg

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 011.jpg

Hardy Shadows 4.20.23 012.jpg

*The square in the middle represents the public spaces (the two story living room and the dining room below it) and the thin rectangle that bisects it shows us the private family rooms at both ends of the house.

Please scroll down to read previous posts on this blog or website.

Wright in the Abstract

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.

IMG_2493.jpeg

IMG_2494.jpeg

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) .jpgAnnunciation Greek Orthodox Church, Wauwatosa, Wisconsin, 1956

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

LR Wingspread (1937).jpgWingspread, 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…