Chicago's Prizes

Biggest, most important showing of modern art in the U. S. is the Carnegie International Exhibition at Pittsburgh, which celebrated its 30th anniversary last month (TIME, Oct. 19). But the richest prizes go to winners at the Chicago Art Institute. Prizes, ranging from the Mr. & Mrs. Frank G. Logan $2,500 first prize down to the William M. R. French memorial medal, total $7,500 as compared with $5,600 in Pittsburgh. Three juries finished their deliberations last week; medals were presented, checks delivered, the public admitted to pass on the juries' findings.

First Logan prize went to Russian-born Morris Kantof for a composition entitled "The Haunted House." Against the background of an early American cottage interior looms a dark shadow, through the shadow are dozens of little cottages. Chicagoans were puzzled.

"One of the strangest paintings ever to win a first prize," said the Chicago Daily News. "It is an amusing creation but seems a trifle thin to have been so greatly honored," commented the Tribune.

Second prize ($1,500) went to Russian-born William Zorach for a monumental piece of sculpture entitled "Mother and Child." Three years ago Sculptor Zorach toured Spain looking for objets d'art. He found a two-ton block of pinkish blue grained marble which he ordered shipped immediately to his studio in Maine. Sculptor Zorach, who is .an apostle of "taille direct" in sculpture, pecked at his block for 18 months and produced the forceful, serene group that won the admiration of New York last winter, won $1.500 in Chicago last week.

Another sculptor who attracted passing attention at the Chicago Art Institute was Stanislaw Szukalski. a passionate Pole who had one well executed statue on view. Several years ago he exhibited a piece upon which the jury smiled. He arrived at the exhibition hall next morning, found a little gilt card marked HONORABLE MENTION pinned to his statue. Sculptor Szukalski tore the card in shreds, flung the pieces in the face of a startled watchman and shouted, "You can't honor me!" Last week nobody tried.

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