Albrecht, respect for your committment: you get up quite early to work on your topic. I myself are not able to follow one logical thought at that time of the day, hence my replys to your blogs come always late at night (when I'm at my best!)

I understand that you are fascinated by Chicago's architecture. That is exactly the reason why I wrote my MA thesis on skyscrapers in Chicago. But pls keep in mind that we are focussing on the 1933-34 expo in that city and that ran completely counter to architectural intentions in that city! Yes, the 1893 expo was influenced by the Chicago school (of architecture) and in turn influenced the architecture of that city in its "city beautiful" movement. But the second fair did not! If you REALLY want to do a comparative study of the two fairs with regard to Chicago architecture, I'll try my best to assist you in research. However, I think you would then move too far away from our seminar topic and would most certainly not be able to work satisfactorily in your group. What shall we do?

You can focus on modern architecture, but functionalism is most clearly NOT present at the Chicago Expo of 1933. Art Deco is in the Expo, but how are you going to relate that to beaux-art-school type of design? Give me a hint and I'll try my best at guiding you!

06:30

9:20 p.m.

Long day full of hard labour. Last but not least: back to my text!

08:25

I got up at six and didn't find my newspaper in the letterbox. Bad luck in the first place turns out to be quite beneficial for my learning progress. Instead of spending hours over newspaper I took my beloved texts and continued to work. If my team mate agrees, I would like our work to focus on the interdependency of contemporary/modern and modernistic architecture and the architecture at Chicago's Century of  Progress Exhibition. (maybe also compare it to 1893)

 Thus I we would have to use the first part of our presentation to introduce the history of architecture in Chicago, main ideas and protagonist,  define terms such as 

- modern

- modernistic 

- beau arts

- art deco 

- functionalism 

etc

During my stay there I focussed on architecture and took loads of pictures we could use to illustrate our presentation.

 

 

So it's the brandy stage already... ;o))) We are just halfway into the semester! What are you going to drink towards the end?
Albrecht, the good thing about Lisa Schrenk's book is that its devoted to the architecture of the Chicago Expo in its entirety. So whatever chapter you read will be -- more or less -- related to your topic. Hope you get some rest at your grandparents' and pls don't forget to contact Sarah about Friday's presentation after you return.

05/24 

9:25 a.m. I'm on a two-day visit to my grand parents in the mountains and therefore offline; no internet here.  I'm going to post these entries as soon as I get back. I'm still reading the book by Lisa Schrenk and really regret having agreed to my team mate doing the summary of chapter II. There's no question, chapter two is my area of expertise. I can't contact her now but I'm simply going to do a brief summary on all the chapters I've read so far which have to do with our field of research. 

This might help me, I hope, filtering the main ideas, draw my own conclusions and keep preserve them by writing them down instantly.

10:29 pm

Everything was printed neatly; I replaced my folder through a ring binder. I went through the text by Christine Kalb first and got the impression that this is the text to be read last. I' just reading the book by Lisa Schrenk. It's very interesting and I'm going to read it from cover to cover. I've printed the first five chapters and will read them tonight and tomorrow. I found the introduction very helpful because it provides a good overview over the aspects that are especially interesting for our project. My teammate intends to write a summary on chapter two. I might take the introduction but don't want to commit myself to it yet. 

I better stop typing now and get back to my text. I've had way too much brandy...