Fountain of Time
Encyclopedia
Sculpture
Sculpture is three-dimensional artwork created by shaping or combining hard materials—typically stone such as marble—or metal, glass, or wood. Softer materials can also be used, such as clay, textiles, plastics, polymers and softer metals...
by Lorado Taft
Lorado Taft
Lorado Zadoc Taft was an American sculptor, writer and educator. Taft was born in Elmwood, Illinois in 1860 and died in his home studio in Chicago in 1936.-Early years and education:...
, measuring 126 in 10 in (38.66 m) in length, situated at the western edge of the Midway Plaisance
Midway Plaisance
The Midway Plaisance, also known locally as the Midway, is a park on the South Side of the city of Chicago, Illinois. It is one mile long by 220 yards wide and extends along 59th and 60th streets, joining Washington Park at its east end and Jackson Park at its west end. It divides the Hyde Park...
within Washington Park
Washington Park (Chicago park)
On December 6, 1879, former U.S. President Ulysses Grant took part in a tree planting ceremony in the park. A memorial boulder with a plaque commemorated the event. In the 1920s black semiprofessional baseball teams played at Washington Park...
in Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, Illinois, in the United States. This location is in the Washington Park community area
Community areas of Chicago
Community areas in Chicago refers to the work of the Social Science Research Committee at University of Chicago which has unofficially divided the City of Chicago into 77 community areas. These areas are well-defined and static...
on Chicago's South Side
South Side (Chicago)
The South Side is a major part of the City of Chicago, which is located in Cook County, Illinois, United States. Much of it has evolved from the city's incorporation of independent townships, such as Hyde Park Township which voted along with several other townships to be annexed in the June 29,...
. Inspired by Henry Austin Dobson
Henry Austin Dobson
Henry Austin Dobson , commonly Austin Dobson, was an English poet and essayist.-Life:He was born at Plymouth, the eldest son of George Clarisse Dobson, a civil engineer, of French descent. When he was about eight, the family moved to Holyhead, and his first school was at Beaumaris in Anglesey...
's poem, "Paradox of Time", and with its 100 figures passing before Father Time
Father Time
Father Time is usually depicted as an elderly bearded man, somewhat worse for wear, dressed in a robe, carrying a scythe and an hourglass or other timekeeping device...
, the work was created as a monument to the first 100 years of peace between the United States and Great Britain, resulting from the Treaty of Ghent
Treaty of Ghent
The Treaty of Ghent , signed on 24 December 1814, in Ghent , was the peace treaty that ended the War of 1812 between the United States of America and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland...
in 1814. Although the fountain's water began running in 1920, the sculpture was not dedicated to the city until 1922. The sculpture is a contributing structure to the Washington Park United States Registered Historic District, which is a National Register of Historic Places
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...
listing.
Part of a larger beautification plan for the Midway Plaisance, Time was constructed from a new type of molded, steel-reinforced concrete that was claimed to be more durable and cheaper than alternatives. It was said to be the first of any kind of finished work of art made of concrete. Before the completion of Millennium Park
Millennium Park
Millennium Park is a public park located in the Loop community area of Chicago in Illinois, USA and originally intended to celebrate the millennium. It is a prominent civic center near the city's Lake Michigan shoreline that covers a section of northwestern Grant Park. The area was previously...
in 2004, it was considered the most important installation in the Chicago Park District
Chicago Park District
The Chicago Park District is the oldest and largest park district in the U.S.A, with a $385 million annual budget. It has the distinction of spending the most per capita on its parks, even more than Boston in terms of park expenses per capita...
. Time is one of several Chicago works of art
Work of art
A work of art, artwork, art piece, or art object is an aesthetic item or artistic creation.The term "a work of art" can apply to:*an example of fine art, such as a painting or sculpture*a fine work of architecture or landscape design...
funded by Benjamin Ferguson
Benjamin Ferguson
Benjamin Franklin Ferguson was an American lumber merchant and philanthropist whose 1905 $1 million charitable trust gift funded seventeen of the most notable public monuments and sculptures in Chicago, Illinois, United States...
's trust fund.
Time has undergone several restorations because of deterioration and decline caused by natural and urban elements. During the late 1990s and the first few years of the 21st century it underwent repairs that corrected many of the problems caused by these earlier restorations. Although extensive renovation of the sculpture was completed as recently as 2005, the supporters of Time continue to seek resources for additional lighting, and the National Trust for Historic Preservation
National Trust for Historic Preservation
The National Trust for Historic Preservation is an American member-supported organization that was founded in 1949 by congressional charter to support preservation of historic buildings and neighborhoods through a range of programs and activities, including the publication of Preservation...
has nominated it for further funding.
Planning
Time, along with many other public works in Chicago, was funded by Benjamin Ferguson's 1905 gift of $United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
1 million ($ million today), to a charitable trust formed to "memorialize events in American History". Lorado Taft
Lorado Taft
Lorado Zadoc Taft was an American sculptor, writer and educator. Taft was born in Elmwood, Illinois in 1860 and died in his home studio in Chicago in 1936.-Early years and education:...
initially conceived a sculpture carved from granite
Granite
Granite is a common and widely occurring type of intrusive, felsic, igneous rock. Granite usually has a medium- to coarse-grained texture. Occasionally some individual crystals are larger than the groundmass, in which case the texture is known as porphyritic. A granitic rock with a porphyritic...
; an alternative plan was to have it chiseled out of Georgia marble, which it is estimated would have cost $30,000 ($) a year for five years. The planned work was intended as part of a Midway beautification which was to include a stream, lagoon
Lagoon
A lagoon is a body of shallow sea water or brackish water separated from the sea by some form of barrier. The EU's habitat directive defines lagoons as "expanses of shallow coastal salt water, of varying salinity or water volume, wholly or partially separated from the sea by sand banks or shingle,...
s, and a series of bridges: a Bridge of Arts at Woodlawn Avenue, a Bridge of Religion at the intersection of Ellis Avenue, and a Bridge of Science at Dorchester Avenue (formerly Madison Avenue). As part of the plan, the two ends of the Midway were to be connected by a canal in the deep depressions linking lagoons in Jackson
Jackson Park (Chicago)
Jackson Park is a 500 acre park on Chicago's South Side, located at 6401 South Stony Island Avenue in the Woodlawn community area. It extends into the South Shore and Hyde Park community areas, bordering Lake Michigan and several South Side neighborhoods...
and Washington Parks.
In 1907, Taft had won the first commission from the Ferguson Fund to create the Fountain of the Great Lakes
Fountain of the Great Lakes
Fountain of the Great Lakes or Spirit of the Great Lakes Fountain is an allegorical sculpture by Lorado Taft in the Art Institute of Chicago South Stanley McCormick Memorial Court south of the Art Institute of Chicago Building in the Loop community area of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United...
at the Art Institute of Chicago
Art Institute of Chicago
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of America's largest accredited independent schools of art and design, located in the Loop in Chicago, Illinois. It is associated with the museum of the same name, and "The Art Institute of Chicago" or "Chicago Art Institute" often refers to either...
. Immediately afterwards, inspired by Daniel Burnham's
Daniel Burnham
Daniel Hudson Burnham, FAIA was an American architect and urban planner. He was the Director of Works for the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. He took a leading role in the creation of master plans for the development of a number of cities, including Chicago and downtown Washington DC...
"Make no little plans" quote, he begin lobbying for a grand Midway beautification plan. In 1912, Art Institute Trustee Frank G. Logan formally presented Taft's plans to the fund's administrators at the Art Institute of Chicago
Art Institute of Chicago
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of America's largest accredited independent schools of art and design, located in the Loop in Chicago, Illinois. It is associated with the museum of the same name, and "The Art Institute of Chicago" or "Chicago Art Institute" often refers to either...
. Taft's proposed Midway Plaisance beautification plan included two possible commemoration themes. His first choice was to honor the memory of the World's Columbian Exposition
World's Columbian Exposition
The World's Columbian Exposition was a World's Fair held in Chicago in 1893 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492. Chicago bested New York City; Washington, D.C.; and St...
that had been held in Jackson Park in 1893. His alternative was to commemorate the centennial of the 1814 Treaty of Ghent "marking a century of perfect understanding between England and America". Since other plans to commemorate the Exposition were under way, the second theme choice was adopted as the justification for a second Taft commission from the Ferguson Fund. Contemporary newspaper accounts anticipated that Taft's entire Midway beautification plan would be approved easily.
Chicago school (architecture)
Chicago's architecture is famous throughout the world and one style is referred to as the Chicago School. The style is also known as Commercial style. In the history of architecture, the Chicago School was a school of architects active in Chicago at the turn of the 20th century...
style, had lost momentum after the 1913 dedication of his Fountain of the Great Lakes. The Beaux Arts style had become dated; instead of funding Taft's large-scale Midway Plaisance beautification plan, and providing the originally planned granite, bronze or Georgia marble materials, the trust only allocated sufficient funds and support for a concrete sculpture.
Time was intended to be matched by a sister fountain, Fountain of Creation, on the opposite end of the Midway. Work was begun but was never completed. The finished portions of Fountain of Creation, depicting figures from the Greek legend of the repopulation of earth after the great flood, are considered Taft's final work, and were given to University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign is a large public research-intensive university in the state of Illinois, United States. It is the flagship campus of the University of Illinois system...
, his alma mater
Alma mater
Alma mater , pronounced ), was used in ancient Rome as a title for various mother goddesses, especially Ceres or Cybele, and in Christianity for the Virgin Mary.-General term:...
. The four surviving elements are figures ranging in height from 5 to 7 ft (1.5 to 2.1 m), and are collectively named Sons and Daughters of Deucalion
Deucalion
In Greek mythology Deucalion was a son of Prometheus and Pronoia. The anger of Zeus was ignited by the hubris of the Pelasgians, and he decided to put an end to the Bronze Age. Lycaon, the king of Arcadia, had sacrificed a boy to Zeus, who was appalled by this savage offering...
and Pyrrha
Pyrrha
In Greek mythology, Pyrrha was the daughter of Epimetheus and Pandora and wife of Deucalion.When Zeus decided to end the Bronze Age with the great deluge, Deucalion and his wife, Pyrrha, were the only survivors...
. Two of these elements stand outside the entrance to the university's Main Library, and two others are located at the south side of Foellinger Auditorium
Foellinger Auditorium
Foellinger Auditorium is a building located on the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign campus in Urbana, Illinois. It is the southernmost building on the main quad, and is directly across the quad from the Illini Union. Its sheer size and its dome shape make it one university’s most...
.
Location and installation
Time is in the Chicago Park District, in the Washington Park community area on Chicago's South Side, near the Midway Plaisance. This location, adjoining the University of ChicagoUniversity of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
campus directly to the East, makes the sculpture a contributing structure to the Washington Park federal Registered Historic District, listed on the National Register of Historic Places
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...
. Time is considered to be the most important piece of monumental art in the Park District, which hosts over 100 art works. Its importance stems from its sculptor, its message, the era in which it was created, and the design of its reflecting pool
Reflecting pool
A reflecting pool or reflection pool is a water feature found in gardens, parks, and at memorial sites. It usually consists of a shallow pool of water, undisturbed by fountain jets, for a calm reflective...
by Howard Van Doren Shaw
Howard Van Doren Shaw
Howard Van Doren Shaw was an American architect. He became one of the best-known architects of his generation in the Chicago area.-Early life and career:...
. Robert Jones, director of design and construction for the Art Institute of Chicago
Art Institute of Chicago
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of America's largest accredited independent schools of art and design, located in the Loop in Chicago, Illinois. It is associated with the museum of the same name, and "The Art Institute of Chicago" or "Chicago Art Institute" often refers to either...
at the time, stated in 1999 that Time was the first finished art piece to be made of any type of concrete.
The sculpture is located a few blocks from Taft's studio, the Lorado Taft Midway Studios
Lorado Taft Midway Studios
The Lorado Taft Midway Studios consist of a converted and relocated barn that became the art studio of one of the early 20th century's most important sculptors, Lorado Taft. It is located in the Woodlawn community area of Chicago, Illinois and is now owned by the University of Chicago. It was...
, now a Chicago Landmark
Chicago Landmark
Chicago Landmark is a designation of the Mayor of Chicago and the Chicago City Council for historic buildings and other sites in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Listed sites are selected after meeting a combination of criteria, including historical, economic, architectural, artistic, cultural,...
and National Historic Landmark
National Historic Landmark
A National Historic Landmark is a building, site, structure, object, or district, that is officially recognized by the United States government for its historical significance...
, located at 60th Street and Ingleside Avenue. Other notable sculptures nearby include Henry Moore
Henry Moore
Henry Spencer Moore OM CH FBA was an English sculptor and artist. He was best known for his semi-abstract monumental bronze sculptures which are located around the world as public works of art....
's National Historic Landmark Nuclear Energy
Nuclear Energy (Henry Moore sculpture)
Nuclear Energy is a bronze sculpture by Henry Moore that is located on the campus of the University of Chicago at the site of world's first nuclear reactor, Chicago Pile-1. It is on Ellis Avenue, between the Max Palevsky West dormitory and the Regenstein Library. This site is located in the Hyde...
, which is on the site of the first self-sustaining nuclear reaction
Chicago Pile-1
Chicago Pile-1 was the world's first man-made nuclear reactor. CP-1 was built on a rackets court, under the abandoned west stands of the original Alonzo Stagg Field stadium, at the University of Chicago. The first self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction was initiated in CP-1 on December 2, 1942...
at the University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
. Jackson Park, connected to Washington Park and Time by the Midway Plaisance, hosts the Chicago Landmark Statue of the Republic
Statue of the Republic
The Statue of the Republic is a gilded bronze sculpture in Jackson Park, Chicago, Illinois. The statue was built in 1918 to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition held in Chicago and the Illinois statehood centennial...
; at one time the Midway Plaisance, Jackson Park and Washington Park were jointly known as "South Park".
There is little agreement on the dimensions of Time, with various sources describing it as between 102 to 127 ft (31.1 to 38.7 m) long. One of the few precise estimates describes it as 126 in 10 in (38.66 m) long, 23 in 6 in (7.16 m) wide and 24 feet (7.3 m) tall. The sources are often unclear about whether they are describing the width of the reflecting pool from exterior wall to exterior wall, the width of the water within the reflecting pool's interior walls, the width of the base of the sculpted mass of humanity, the width of the sculpted masses themselves, or the width of the parcel
Lot (real estate)
In real estate, a lot or plot is a tract or parcel of land owned or meant to be owned by some owner. A lot is essentially considered a parcel of real property in some countries or immovable property in other countries...
of land upon which Time is built.
Water began running in the completed sculpture on September 1, 1920, although it was not dedicated to the city until November 15, 1922. University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
President Harry Pratt Judson
Harry Pratt Judson
Harry Pratt Judson was a U.S. educator and historian, born at Jamestown, N. Y., and educated at Williams College , where he was a brother of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity...
delivered an address at the dedication ceremony at the Midway Plaisance, before contributions from Taft. President of the B.F. Ferguson Trust Charles Hutchinson, and John Barton Payne, President of the South Park Board.
Design and realization
The sculpture is made of a form of hollow-cast concreteConcrete
Concrete is a composite construction material, composed of cement and other cementitious materials such as fly ash and slag cement, aggregate , water and chemical admixtures.The word concrete comes from the Latin word...
, reinforced with steel
Steel
Steel is an alloy that consists mostly of iron and has a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.1% by weight, depending on the grade. Carbon is the most common alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used, such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten...
. It was cast in a 4,500-piece mold, using 250 short tons (226.8 t) of a material described as "concrete-like", which incorporated pebble
Pebble
A pebble is a clast of rock with a particle size of 4 to 64 millimetres based on the Krumbein phi scale of sedimentology. Pebbles are generally considered to be larger than granules and smaller than cobbles . A rock made predominantly of pebbles is termed a conglomerate...
s from the Potomac River
Potomac River
The Potomac River flows into the Chesapeake Bay, located along the mid-Atlantic coast of the United States. The river is approximately long, with a drainage area of about 14,700 square miles...
. This composite material was an innovation at the time. For years, John Joseph Earley
John Joseph Earley
John Joseph Earley was the son of James Earley, a fourth generation Irish stone carver and ecclesiastical artist...
of Washington, DC, had used materials that seemed durable in the face of elements such as the weather and urban soot and grime. He had determined that by adding crushed pebbles he could create a new concrete mixture more durable than limestone
Limestone
Limestone is a sedimentary rock composed largely of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate . Many limestones are composed from skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral or foraminifera....
but cheaper than marble or bronze
Bronze
Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...
. The reflection from the silica of the crushed stones complemented the durability with artistic beauty; the same material was used at Chicago's Fine Arts Building
Fine Arts Building (Chicago)
The ten-story Fine Arts Building, also known as the Studebaker Building, is located on Michigan Avenue across from Grant Park in Chicago in the Chicago Landmark Historic Michigan Boulevard District. It was built for the Studebaker company in 1884–5 by Solon Spencer Beman, and extensively remodeled...
.
The sculpture depicts a hooded Father Time
Father Time
Father Time is usually depicted as an elderly bearded man, somewhat worse for wear, dressed in a robe, carrying a scythe and an hourglass or other timekeeping device...
carrying a scythe
Scythe
A scythe is an agricultural hand tool for mowing grass, or reaping crops. It was largely replaced by horse-drawn and then tractor machinery, but is still used in some areas of Europe and Asia. The Grim Reaper is often depicted carrying or wielding a scythe...
, and watching over a parade of 100 figures arranged in an ellipse
Ellipse
In geometry, an ellipse is a plane curve that results from the intersection of a cone by a plane in a way that produces a closed curve. Circles are special cases of ellipses, obtained when the cutting plane is orthogonal to the cone's axis...
, with an overall pyramid
Pyramid
A pyramid is a structure whose outer surfaces are triangular and converge at a single point. The base of a pyramid can be trilateral, quadrilateral, or any polygon shape, meaning that a pyramid has at least three triangular surfaces...
al geometry. The allegorical
Allegory
Allegory is a demonstrative form of representation explaining meaning other than the words that are spoken. Allegory communicates its message by means of symbolic figures, actions or symbolic representation...
procession depicts the entire spectrum of humanity at various stages of life. The contemporary 1920s Chicago Daily Tribune described the figures as "heroic", and that choice of adjective has stayed with the piece. The figures are said to be passing in review as they rush through the stages of life, and include soldiers, frolicking children and kissing couples. Father Time is described in various newspaper articles as "huge", "weird", and "dominant". Other Tribune critics described Time as a "pet atrocity" of Taft in large part due to its ugliness. One critic described the white figures as reminiscent of false teeth smiling across the end of the Midway.
Time commemorates the first 100 years of peace between the United States and Great Britain after the Treaty of Ghent
Treaty of Ghent
The Treaty of Ghent , signed on 24 December 1814, in Ghent , was the peace treaty that ended the War of 1812 between the United States of America and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland...
concluded the War of 1812
War of 1812
The War of 1812 was a military conflict fought between the forces of the United States of America and those of the British Empire. The Americans declared war in 1812 for several reasons, including trade restrictions because of Britain's ongoing war with France, impressment of American merchant...
on December 24, 1814. The design was inspired by the poem "Paradox of Time" by Henry Austin Dobson
Henry Austin Dobson
Henry Austin Dobson , commonly Austin Dobson, was an English poet and essayist.-Life:He was born at Plymouth, the eldest son of George Clarisse Dobson, a civil engineer, of French descent. When he was about eight, the family moved to Holyhead, and his first school was at Beaumaris in Anglesey...
: "Time goes, you say? Ah no, Alas, time stays, we go". Times theme has been compared to Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
's All the world's a stage monologue in As You Like It
As You Like It
As You Like It is a pastoral comedy by William Shakespeare believed to have been written in 1599 or early 1600 and first published in the folio of 1623. The play's first performance is uncertain, though a performance at Wilton House in 1603 has been suggested as a possibility...
, which describes the seven ages of man: infant, schoolboy, lover, soldier, justice, old age, and dementia. Taft's figures represent birth, the struggle for existence, love, family life, religion, poetry, and war.
Although most of the figures are generic representations of human forms in various walks and stages of life, Taft included himself, with one of his assistants following him, along the west side of the sculpture. He is portrayed wearing a smock, with his head bowed and hands clasped behind his back. His daughters served as models for some of the figures.
Taft is now better remembered for his books, such as The History of American Sculpture (1903), regarded as the first comprehensive work on the subject. However, in his day he was well-known for portrait
Portrait
thumb|250px|right|Portrait of [[Thomas Jefferson]] by [[Rembrandt Peale]], 1805. [[New-York Historical Society]].A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expression is predominant. The intent is to display the likeness,...
s and allegorical public sculpture, of which Fountain of Time is a prime example. It was produced in the period following his assignment to design sculptures for William Le Baron Jenney
William Le Baron Jenney
William Le Baron Jenney was an American architect and engineer who became known as the Father of the American skyscraper.- Life and career :...
's 1893 Horticultural Building for the World's Columbian Exposition
World's Columbian Exposition
The World's Columbian Exposition was a World's Fair held in Chicago in 1893 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492. Chicago bested New York City; Washington, D.C.; and St...
. During this period he designed several large-scale public works, including Fountain of the Great Lakes. Taft resided in Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
for most of his life and worked in the Midway Studios
Lorado Taft Midway Studios
The Lorado Taft Midway Studios consist of a converted and relocated barn that became the art studio of one of the early 20th century's most important sculptors, Lorado Taft. It is located in the Woodlawn community area of Chicago, Illinois and is now owned by the University of Chicago. It was...
starting in 1906.
Restoration
Designed without expansion joints, Time is one of a small number of outdoor sculptures made of reinforced pebble/concrete aggregate, few of which have been created since the 1930s. In 1936, Times weather-related cracks were repaired; further work occurred in 1955. The sculpture's subsequent repairs were followed by a rededication celebration in 1966. Although the sculpture received regular maintenance, early repair crews often did more harm than good, by using techniques such as sandblasting and patching cracks with rigid materials.By the 1980s the sculpture was crumbling; cracks had developed, details of the figures had worn away, and moisture had eroded the internal structure. In wintertime the fountain had to be protected by a tarp
Tarpaulin
A tarpaulin, colloquially tarp, is a large sheet of strong, flexible, water-resistant or waterproof material, often cloth such as canvas or polyester coated with urethane, or made of plastics such as polyethylene. In some places such as Australia, and in military slang, a tarp may be known as a...
. Weather, air pollution
Air pollution
Air pollution is the introduction of chemicals, particulate matter, or biological materials that cause harm or discomfort to humans or other living organisms, or cause damage to the natural environment or built environment, into the atmosphere....
, and vandalism meant that hundreds of thousands of dollars were now needed for restoration.
The Chicago Park District, University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
, and Art Institute of Chicago
Art Institute of Chicago
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of America's largest accredited independent schools of art and design, located in the Loop in Chicago, Illinois. It is associated with the museum of the same name, and "The Art Institute of Chicago" or "Chicago Art Institute" often refers to either...
conservators all sponsored restoration work, including drying out the cavity of the hollow sculpture, removal of the deteriorated substructure, a newly designed ventilation system within the piece, a protective exterior coating, and repairs to the reflecting pool. In 1989 Chicago Park District allocated $150,000 to the repair project, which amount was matched by the Ferguson fund. By the end of 1991, the Park District had collected $320,000 of the $520,000 estimated repair costs from public and private funds, although in 1994 the sculpture still awaited repair.
By early 1997, after almost two decades of activity, the only repairs completed were phase one of the air ventilation system to dehumidify the hollow base, the drainage pipes and a new inner roof. Plans now included the erection of a temporary two-story metal building to protect all but the giant Father Time from the harsh winters and to facilitate year-round repair; the reinforcement of corroded steel interior portions; the replacement of inconsistent patches; the substitution of engineered spacing for natural cracks, and finally, hand-brushed concrete recoating. The temporary building was budgeted at $270,000; the city spent a total of $450,000 on repairs approved by the Park District that year.
On April 19, 1999, the $1.6 million, two-year phase two restoration began, scheduled for completion by May 2001. Five workers began repairing the cracks, killing biological growth, removing calcium
Calcium
Calcium is the chemical element with the symbol Ca and atomic number 20. It has an atomic mass of 40.078 amu. Calcium is a soft gray alkaline earth metal, and is the fifth-most-abundant element by mass in the Earth's crust...
deposits and pollution-blackened gypsum
Gypsum
Gypsum is a very soft sulfate mineral composed of calcium sulfate dihydrate, with the chemical formula CaSO4·2H2O. It is found in alabaster, a decorative stone used in Ancient Egypt. It is the second softest mineral on the Mohs Hardness Scale...
, and coating the 10000 square feet (929 m²) surface with a combination of lime putty, adobe
Adobe
Adobe is a natural building material made from sand, clay, water, and some kind of fibrous or organic material , which the builders shape into bricks using frames and dry in the sun. Adobe buildings are similar to cob and mudbrick buildings. Adobe structures are extremely durable, and account for...
cement and sand. The inoperable reflecting pool was not repaired in this phase. Although this phase was completed in 2001, its effects were not visible until the following year, when the temporary protective structure was unveiled. The repairs were expected to sustain the sculpture for about 30–50 years before any further repairs would be necessary.
In 2003, the National Endowment for the Arts
National Endowment for the Arts
The National Endowment for the Arts is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created by an act of the U.S. Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal government. Its current...
committed $250,000 to the Park District for the conservation and restoration of the reflecting pool. In 2004, the University of Chicago contributed $100,000 and the Park District Board $845,000 to repair the pool and its water circulation system. This work was carried out in the summer of 2005 at a slightly reduced budget, and the fountain was filled with water for the first time in over fifty years.
In 2007, efforts began to add lighting. That same year the sculpture was nominated for the Chicagoland Initiative, a fund for the preservation of historic sites, backed by the National Trust for Historic Preservation and American Express. In a widely publicized contest that included open house events where the public could tour and learn about the competing historic sites, $1 million was available for preservation efforts in the Chicago metropolitan area, but the fountain was not one of the 15 winning candidates.
Gallery
Below are pictures of the Fountain of Time in August 2007, after restoration.Below are pictures of the Fountain of Time taken before the restoration.