12-foot omphalos helps tell a story

Last week, I wrote a post about storytelling in unique media - here's another example.

Even public art can inspire stories.

Picture the sculpture, "Cloud Gate," by Anish Kapoor in Chicago’s Millennium Park. The sculpture is shaped like an ellipse, and its legume-like appearance has caused it to be nicknamed The Bean. It is made of 168 highly polished stainless steel plates, and stands at 33 feet high, 66 feet long, and 42 feet wide, weighing 110 tons.

From a distance it could be mistaken for a huge drop of mercury, while up close its highly reflective surface captures and transforms the skyline, the downtown cityscape and even the passers-by into a wonderfully warped new vista. The 12-foot underbelly is called the “omphalos” or navel and multiplies reflections in a vortex. The artist, Anish Kapoor, has referred to the sculpture as “a gate to Chicago, a poetic idea about the city it reflects.”

"What I wanted to do in Millennium Park is make something that would engage the Chicago skyline…so that one will see the clouds kind of floating in, with those very tall buildings reflected in the work. And then, since it is in the form of a gate, the participant, the viewer, will be able to enter into this very deep chamber that does, in a way, the same thing to one's reflection as the exterior of the piece is doing to the reflection of the city around," Kapoor said. "I hope what I have done is make a serious work, which deals with serious questions about form, public space and an object in space. You can capture the popular imagination and hold other points of interest, but that is not what I set out to do, although there is inevitably a certain spectacular in an object like this."

Chicago on Dwellable

2016 Olympic bid: Chicago makes glossy pitch for Olympics in Istanbul today

Guests at the Istanbul Hilton woke up this morning to find striking views of Chicago under their room doors.

Wrapped around copies of the International Herald Tribune was a four-page section on high-quality glossy paper celebrating what its cover called, in French and English, "a spectacular setting for sport."

The front-page photo was an aerial view of Millennium Park, with the logo of Chicago's 2016 Olympic bid in the lower-right corner.

The promotional section was aimed at the Olympic officials gathered for the 37th General Assembly of the European Olympic Committees. The four candidates for the 2016 Summer Games - Chicago, Madrid, Tokyo and Rio de Janeiro - are to present highlights of their bid plans to the gathering this afternoon. Below shows the President of Turkey,Abdullah Gül, and the IOC.



The special section, included with only those IHT copies distributed at the Hilton, also had pictures of the Chicago marathon, the Chicago triathlon, 2007 World Boxing Championships in Chicago, a beach volleyball tournament and the lakefront parks.

The cost of the promotion was said to be about $10,000.

"Each year tens of millions of people attend cultural festivals and sporting events in Chicago's lake front parks and around the city," says the text block on the inside pages. "Chicago's passion for sport is visible throughout the year in massive participation, cheering sections for every team and sold-out events in every arena."

All four pages showed off the panoramas a worldwide TV audience might see in 2016, since the Chicago bid focuses on having events concentrated in the center of the city.

"Chicago's historic lake front green spaces form a ready-made Olympic park set against the dramatic backdrop of the city skyline," reads the text accompanying the back cover picture of the city looking south from Lincoln Park. Many of these locations are just steps away from the best that Chicago has to offer - cultural, shopping, dining and the main entertainment district."

Follow the BBC Turkish link for more on the Chicago pitch: http://ad.vu/5xx .