November 23, 2019. It’s official name is “Cloud Gate.” Everyone calls it “The Bean.” It has become the iconic Chicago experience.

I go to Chicago several times a year. It began with opera, but now I go as much to hang out with my Chicago photographer friends, all of whom I met through the now defunct social media platform Google+ and its several spin off organizations.

Unless the weather is truly nasty, my trips to Chicago produce lots of photographic raw material to work with. Without doing the count, I would guess that of the photographs I submit to juried shows, more come from Chicago than any other single location.

On this particular November 2019 trip, my friends and I met at the Garfield Park Conservatory and spent the morning there. Then we adjourned to The Loop for lunch, after which we roamed and shot and talked and sort of naturally drifted toward Millenium Park and The Bean.

Some amazing photographs have been made of The Bean. And if you should see one that contains no people, know that the photographer either went there in the wee hours of the morning, or had the cooperation of city officials in barricading the crowds out of sight!

#YearInReview #BestOf2019