<p>Larry W. Green, a 1975 graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, has put together a dynamic book of digital photographs and paintings depicting water tanks in all their glory. Water Tanks of Chicago: A Vanishing Urban Legacy grew out of one artist s vision as he started to sketch and paint the urban environment in and around Chicago. Green found himself drawn to water tanks as iconic symbols of the city. The tanks were distinctive all by themselves, and an integral part of the city s skyline. As SAIC President Tony Jones, says in his Foreword to the book, Chicago s crumbling water-tanks take on a new significance when seen in Green s paintings surely we knew they were there, they d registered, but they weren t the star of the street-show. But we ve woken up to them, become part of his celebration of them as dynamic incidents in what is clearly a Chicago landscape.</p>

Water Tanks of Chicago: A Vanishing Urban Legacy

Arts & Photography

Anthony Jones

Larry W Green

Painting

Wicker Park Press, Ltd.

<p>Tom Palazzolo, a veteran Chicago filmmaker and photographer, has put together the book At Maxwell Street: Chicago s Historic Marketplace Recalled in Words and Photographs. In 1983, he led a team of his students and colleagues in creating a seminal documentary film called At Maxwell Street. A DVD version of the film is included in the book, about 50 minutes in length, along with additional compelling images of life on the street. Bill Stamets, a columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times, writes an essay on the DVD for the book, and he says of Palazzolo and his film, That street and this artist shared a kindred hustle and humor ... All manner of social occasions and minor rituals have drawn his attention for over forty years. In detail and editing he has shown off a surreal, juvenile wit. The book and the DVD combine to make a multilayered portrait of the long-gone Maxwell Street marketplace, which was razed by city officials and the University of Illinois at Chicago in 2001 to make way for development of the upscale University Village neighborhood. Palazzolo captures the essence of Maxwell Street in this book, and he employs a host of other artists to help him bring the old place back to life. Lionel Bottari, who grew up in the Maxwell Street neighborhood and whose father was a stall owner there, provides a poignant reminiscence. Linda Platt, a writer who grew up in the Back of the Yards neighborhood, tells a dramatic story of an incident that occurred in Maxwell Street when she was a child. Her husband, John Platt, provides two free-verse poems about Maxwell Street. Marcia Palazzolo, wife of the artist, and Bernard Beckman, another graduate of SAIC, each have their own sections of photographs in the book.</p>

At Maxwell Street: Chicago's Historic Marketplace Recalled in Words and Photographs

History

Tom Palazzolo

Americas

The neon sign is quickly fading from the Chicago landscape. At one time neon signs were a common sight in every neighborhood throughout the city. The signs brought energy and excitement to a community, and would attract people to local gathering places such as restaurants, theaters, and bowling alleys. Through time and continuous exposure to harsh Midwest elements the neon signs have begun to decay. During the day the remnants of many old signs display faded paint, rusting sides, and empty holes where glass tubes were once housed. But at night some signs still glow like a beacon on a dreary street. Since 2003, Chicago librarian and artist Dan Zamudio has photographed many of these signs, and he has collected them in a new book, Chicago Neon Signs: Neighborhood and Downtown Landmarks through a Toy Camera. The toy camera is called a Diana. The Diana camera is made of plastic, including the lens. Plastic lens produce a slightly blurred focus that can create beautiful surreal images. Zamudio has used the Diana to startling artistic affect, and many of his images are not complete representations of neon signs. Instead, sections of the signs are displayed, conveying enough information for viewers to recognize the sign. The signs in the book are rendered in glorious black and white, and offer a poignant and nostalgic look back at a bygone era.

Chicago Neon Signs: Neighborhood and Downtown Landmarks Through a Toy Camera

Dan Zamudio

Individual Artists

On the night the SS rounded up the Jews of his Ukrainian ghetto, eighteen-year-old Yosel Epelbaum crawled on his hands and knees to a nearby forest. There he joined a diverse band of pro-Soviet partisans, led by a kind of warlord in the wilderness, who created a forest republic behind Nazi lines. With his courageous comrades, Epelbaum, disrupted the German war effort for almost a year and a half and saved hundreds of civilians at the same time. After the liberation the young survivor became caught up in Europe s robust black market. With little money or formal education, and knowing no English, he immigrated to San Francisco in 1947 and within a year opened an ice cream shop. Only a decade later Joe Pell was well on his way to becoming one of the leading real estate developers in Northern California. Taking risks, related in a taut and vivid style, is his story- one of loss and torment but also daring, ingenuity and uncommon resilience.

Taking Risks: A Jewish Youth in the Soviet Partisans and His Unlikely Life in California

Joseph Pell

World

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