Kansas City Star, The (MO)
2007-04-15
Section: News
Page: 1
 

In Chicago's Millennium Park you can go face to face with the Crown Fountain.

CHICAGO - On a summer evening three years ago, two friends and I ate delectable chocolates and watched a breathtaking display of fireworks burst across Lake Michigan.

It was opening night for Millennium Park, and Chicago was celebrating its newest point of pride.

Thanks to the crowds, we couldn't get too close that evening, but it was clear that Millennium Park was already becoming an experience.

By the time I got to see the park again, the opening-night throng had long dissipated. There were no fireworks.

As another friend, Heather, and I exited the cab at Michigan Avenue and Monroe Street, the first thing we saw were two glass towers facing each other. From each one, water spewed onto the concrete that separated them.

"This is another one of those modern art pieces that I have a hard time wrapping my mind around," I thought to myself.

I couldn't have been more wrong.

After another long, cold winter, on Monday Chicago is scheduled to turn the water back on at the Crown Fountain, one of Millennium Park's best-known attractions.

Crown Fountain is essentially interactive people-watching. We ve all sat at the mall, enthralled by the different shapes, sizes and attitudes of people walking by. The difference at Crown Fountain is that giant video screens give the illusion that the people are watching you, too.

With help from the Art Institute of Chicago, Spanish artist Jaume Plensa used the faces of regular Chicagoans to create 21st-century gargoyles, displayed by digital video on 22,000 10-pound glass blocks that make up two 50-foot towers, separated by a reflecting pool.

"We sent out letters to nearly 1,000 community organizations asking for volunteers to be the faces," said John Manning, associate professor of art and technology at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

"About 20 students were involved in shooting and postproduction, and it took us three years from beginning to end."

Heather and I sat down on a bench where we could observe the changing faces and their changing expressions on the giant LED screens. Each face remains for five minutes. They look around and smile, blink and make faces, appearing to interact with the crowd. Then, before the mug blends into the face of another person, the model puckers her lips, preparing to spew water into a shallow reflecting pool.

One of the trickiest feats in filming the faces was to make sure each one was positioned in the same place, creating the illusion that the water was actually coming from the person's mouth.

To accomplish this, art students placed their muses in an old-fashioned dental chair to keep their heads steady.

"The trick was to get the heads not to bob while the people we were filming held their necks in a pretty unnatural position," Manning said.

On average, filming took more than an hour and required two to three takes per face.

One of the hundreds of faces rotating on the fountain is that of Jerry Donovan, a Pittsburgh native who had lived in Chicago since 1970. Donovan, who died last year at age 72, was very active in community organizations and heard about the fountain project through one of the letters.

"One of his nurses recognized him as one of the Millennium Park faces, and someone even stopped him on the street," said his son, Mike Donovan. "He became a little bit of a minor celebrity in Chicago."

Donovan said he thought his father's participation in the project would help immortalize him.

"When you think of all of the people in Chicago -- and there is just a small percentage of those people on the fountain -- it is a pretty neat story his family will be able to tell," he said.

Unfortunately for the hundreds of participants and their families, the films were not numbered or cataloged, so none of the models knows when his face might appear. Donovan said only one nephew so far had been able to catch Jerry's face on the fountain.

One of the organizers goals was to ensure that a broad range of Chicagoans would be represented.

"We wanted an exact portrait representing the population of Chicago," Manning said.

As a result, the fountain displays people from every imaginable ethnic and cultural background, as well as different age groups.

Native Chicagoan Gretchen Husting said she was proud to be one of them.

"It is an important project for Chicago," said Husting, 44. "I think it really shows our city's diversity."

Although Millennium Park offers plenty of other attractions, Heather and I found it difficult to turn away from the faces when we visited on a summer evening as the sun was setting. We never saw the same face twice.

As a sideshow and just as much fun, the reflecting pool between the fountains has become a popular cool-down spot for families and their children, who run and play in the spraying water.

Getting there

Millennium Park is on the north end of Grant Park along Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago. Besides the Crown Fountain, the 24 1/2 -acre park has several other signature attractions, including the much-photographed "Cloud Gate," a 110-ton stainless-steel sculpture that looks kind of like a jelly bean; the serpentine 925-foot BP Bridge by architect Frank Gehry; the Jay Pritzker Pavilion, an outdoor concert venue; and Lurie Garden.

When to go

The park is open from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. daily. Visit during the evening in spring, summer or early fall to catch a concert.

The water at Crown Fountain is to be turned on Monday and will stay on until mid-October.

The McCormick Tribune Plaza Ice Rink is open from November to March.

Where to eat

In warm weather the ice rink at McCormick Tribune Plaza, Michigan Avenue and Washington Street, is converted to outdoor dining. Just below, the Park Grill offers a wide variety of contemporary American food, including seafood, pastas and steaks. It is one of many restaurants within walking distance of the park. (312) 521-7275.

Where to stay

Within walking distance of Millennium Park:

Hard Rock Chicago, 230 N. Michigan Ave. From $229. (312) 345-1000, hardrockhotelchicago.com.

Hilton Chicago, 720 S. Michigan Ave. From $149. (312) 922-4400, hilton.com.

Hyatt Regency Chicago, 151 E. Wacker Drive, from $119. (312) 565-1234, chicagohyatt.com

To learn more

Chicago Convention and Visitors Bureau: choosechicago.com, (877) 244-2246.

Millennium Park: millenniumpark.org, (312) 742-1168

"It is an important project for Chicago. I think it really shows our city's diversity."

-- GRETCHEN HUSTING, ON CHICAGO S CROWN FOUNTAIN, WHICH DISPLAYS PEOPLE FROM EVERY IMAGINABLE BACKGROUND AND AGE GROUP

Kerri Fivecoat-Campbell is a freelance writer in Kansas City, Kan. - Kerri Fivecoat-Campbell, Special to The Star

TRAVELER'S CHECK - MILLENNIUM PARK, CHICAGO

In Millennium Park you can go face to face with Crown Fountain.