Eager art lovers and buyers at Burr Ridge Art Fair
by the Chicago Tribune | June 22nd, 2021
Artist Mark Hersch said he signed up immediately when he heard about the new art fair in the Burr Ridge Village Center.
“I do a lot of shows in Chicago and the northern suburbs,” he said, but was interested in selling at shows in the western suburbs, too.
“It has been a busy morning,” Hersch said Saturday, the first day of the two-day Burr Ridge Art Fair.
In his artwork, called Time After Time Rephotography, Hersch blends two photos of the same place taken in different centuries.
“I take old photos I find at museums, historical societies, the National Archives and then I shoot the exact same picture in the present day from the same viewpoint,” Hersch said.
In Chicago, that means vintage automobiles circa 1939 drive by Wrigley Field with modern cars, as the marquee proclaims the Cubs are playing Brooklyn.
A streetcar in 1900 rumbles down State Street, past Macy’s department store and the colorful, neon-lit Chicago Theater.
And firefighters on a horse-drawn wagon carrying water urns in 1905 pause before a Chicago Firehouse photographed in 2019.
Hersch is careful to take the new photo at the same time of day as the old one, so the shadows and the light match.
Ann Hardy of Elmhurst holds a photo bought as a gift for a firefighter. (Kimberly Fornek / Pioneer Press)
C.J. Hardy of Elmhurst came to Burr Ridge to look for artwork for his empty walls, but bought Hersch’s fire station picture as a present for his brother, who is a firefighter.
Saturday was Mark Weiner’s birthday, so he and his wife Diane came to the art show to buy him a birthday present.
“But the very first thing we bought was something for me, a ring made of buffalo bone and horn,” Diane Weiner said.
They did find a gift for Mark, after buying outdoor metal sculptures for their yard from another artist.
Mark Weiner chose a colorful painting of a rearranged Chicago skyline populated with superheroes and cartoon characters, such as Spiderman and Yosemite Sam, and King Kong holding Barbie.
“I grew up watching Batman and Robin on TV,” Weiner said, explaining why he liked the picture, which he described as filled with “tchotchkes and crap.”
Mark & Diane Weiner hold the photo Diane bought for Mark for his birthday, June 19. (Kimberly Fornek / Pioneer Press)
Pearlie Taylor sells her abstract art primarily in Chicago galleries. When dealing with the weather at outdoor shows “disasters can happen and be costly,” Taylor said.
But after being cooped up so long during the pandemic, she said she was eager to get out and talk to people and talk to people about art, so she rented a booth at the Burr Ridge show, her first art fair in five years.
The abstract art of Pearlie Taylor, lower left, includes layering seven to 10 sheets of thin paper each separately painted, such as the bright blue works, in her booth at the Burr Ridge art show. (Kimberly Fornek / Pioneer Press)
“It’s a wonderful feeling and I like hearing how they interpret what they see in abstract art.”
David Schubert was pleased with his sales, two watercolors by noon Saturday, and the weather.
“It’s a little windy, but if it wasn’t, we’d be cooked.”
Schubert is a dentist and a painter. All the money from his art sales support a free dental clinic he has operated in Haiti for 26 years.
David Schubert stands by his watercolor (top) of the beach in the Haitian coastal city of Jacmel, which he describes as "clean, safe and unbelievable." (Kimberly Fornek / Pioneer Press)