(bouncy music) - [Narrator] Illinois Stories is brought to you by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Illinois Arts Council Agency and by the support of viewers like you.

Thank you.

- Hello.

Welcome to Illinois Stories.

I'm Mark McDonald in Springfield at the Illinois state Capitol.

Most people know this as one of the finest public buildings in the country.

Many people don't know it's one of the great repositories of art in the state of Illinois.

Take the tour with us.

Mark Sorenson, before we get to one of the biggest paintings in the Capitol, I want to talk about you just a little bit because about 20 years ago you put together a program for the Centennial celebration of the Capitol building and it involved learning about the art that's in the building.

- Right.

- So you sort of took this on as a study and since then you've been giving tours through the Capitol to groups who want to learn more about the art.

- Right.

It was a part-time job of my full-time employment at the Illinois state archives.

Now I'm retired and I'm president of the Illinois state historical society.

So I have a temporary exhibit here on the history of the Capitol.

It's been up for 22 years.

- A temporary (laughing).

- And until I retired I would help give VIP tours and foreign delegation tours.

- Yeah.

- And answer people's questions.

- And today it's for Illinois Stories.

- Right.

- So here we are.

We're on the third level.

We're looking at this massive 40 foot tall painting.

It's one of the first things people see when they come in the Capitol.

- Right.

- Tell us a little bit about who this is and what it means.

- Well, this is a oil painting on canvas and it was done, finished in 1886.

It represents George Rogers Clark meeting with Indians in Kaskaskia in 1778 during the middle of the American Revolution.

So Clark volunteered to come here from Virginia to nullify the British strength there at Fort Gage on top of the hill.

And Clark is negotiating with the Indians asking them to stay out of the conflict while he and his men defeat the British and capture that Fort.

The Fort will be captured for Virginia during the revolution.

Later, Clark and his volunteers will walk knee-deep or waist deep or neck deep in water across Illinois to Vincennes, Indiana and defeat the British at that Fort.

Thereby, when the peace treaty comes with the British at the end of the American Revolution, the American side can claim Illinois during the peace treaty and negotiated that way.

Thus, the United States ends up with Illinois and everything east of the Mississippi river and Britain loses them.

- Now, this is the same Clark that was on, on the expedition- - Northwest passage.

Northwest passage.

- Yeah.

- This is his brother.

- His brother.

Okay.

This is the fellow that founded Louisville, Kentucky, I believe.

This is, the brother of his had found Louisville, Kentucky went up down the river, Ohio river.

So, okay.

So he's got, you can see he's got his, his pioneer fellows are down at the bottom here and there.

Was the relationship between these Indians and the military men at that time, a decent one or had it soured by then?

- Well, I'm not sure what the relationship between the Indians and the British.

The British had power in that area by having a Fort to control trade but by promising the Indians that the the new Americans would not be harmful to the Indians they allowed the Americans not to have to fight them as well as fight the British Garrison.

When the painting was done by Gustav Fuchs, a recent immigrant to the United States working out of Chicago, it's 1886.

And part of the criticism of the artwork is that he's painting perhaps Plains Indians with teepees on a scene that was supposed to take place in Western Illinois, where there perhaps weren't any teepees- - Right, right.

- Or some of those style of dress for the Indians.

- Well, Mark, just a couple of years ago, they completed the restoration work in the House here.

Much of the work was done on the ceiling itself.

Wasn't it?

- That's correct.

These ceilings were ruined by water from fires in 1933 and 1935.

And the artwork that was put up here in the 1880s was all erased and painted over.

So in this latest restoration the Evergreen Studios has recreated, from the use of photographs and scrapings, the actual artwork that was put up here in the 1880s.

- [Mark McDonald] Wow!

- [Mark Sorenson] And so here, one of the things you can see close is, an E Pluribus Unum and a shield with the Eagle.

And there were lots of patriotic designs at that time, a few years after the Civil War.

- [Mark McDonald] It's just beautiful.

I mean, it just glimmers.

It just, it just shines.

It's so beautiful.

Speaking of shining, those chandeliers, they were original, weren't they?

- [Mark Sorenson] Yes, these are the, we're in the House.

So there are four original gas lit chandeliers and these contain all the elements of those original four chandeliers.

Originally, again, they were gas with a long copper tube holding them down.

These have been recreated by the St. Louis antique light company.

And, so it's all the, as much of the original crystal as is left.

And, they're very nice.

- Okay, Mark, we're standing in Senate room 400.

It's a hearing room now.

- Right.

- But it wasn't always.

You call it the lost room because it has a very interesting history.

- Right.

This is the top half of room 300.

So when the Capitol was built it started out as the art gallery, and then in 1884, it became the Hall of Flags.

So below us, in what would be the floor of room 300 were walnut and glass cases with all the battle flags.

And for two years, all the veterans would come up here on the one elevator that was available in the Capitol to view the battle flags and the remnants from the Civil War.

And also they would see these paintings that were painted up here on the high walls of room 300.

After two years, the veterans got the room to be moved down to the new first floor.

It was easier to get to and this room was then used as a law library and then eventually the state historical library and historical society uses for quite a few years.

But in 1923, I've lost track of what happens in the room.

And sometime in that era or the 1930s, the ceiling is lowered for room 300 to make it a modern office below us.

And in the 1970s, this space was discovered by an electrician who said, "You have paintings up in your fly space."

(Mark McDonald laughing) So in the 1970s, they mezzanined the floor and cut a hole in the wall back here to make a door off of the fourth floor corridor.

And turn this into a Senate hearing room.

Is refurbished several times but in 2004, this current restoration was done, again, by Evergreen Studios.

And so the artwork has been restored, cracks patched, and colors highlighted and cleaned and all the other decoration, again, we got from archival photographs and scrapings and Evergreen made a pattern of it by hand from scrapings and then used the computer to generate larger images.

- Uh-huh!

- And all you see on the border on top and along the sides in the blue, is what I call wallpaper.

It's a computer generated design.

But over here in this corner, on the north-east part of the room, these are hand painted panels from the Evergreen artists who went back and tried to recreate it by hand the same way the artists did that in the 1886, 1884.

- [Mark McDonald] And if I'm understanding you, all that artwork including US Grant and Abraham Lincoln, were all hidden for a time.

- [Mark Sorenson] Yes.

All hidden- - Nobody even knew they were here.

- [Mark Sorenson] The best we know, from probably the early 1930s up through about 1971, '72.

- [Mark McDonald] Wow!

What a find, huh?

- [Mark Sorenson] Yeah.

- [Mark McDonald] Now I know why you call it the lost room.

- Right.

(Mark McDonald laughing) - [Mark McDonald] Mark, on any given day, you can stand in the rotunda and look at people with their head up just gawking at the dome and starting with this thousands of pieces of stained glass.

It's incredible.

- [Mark Sorenson] Yes, it's a very striking and all new tourists immediately lift their head straight up.

What you're looking at right now, is a glass oculus with the rendition of the state seal in stained glass in the middle.

And you're looking at the inner dome.

There is also an outer dome which people can see from outside.

And there's probably 60 feet difference between the two.

When WW Boyington designed this finishing of the inner dome in the 1885 and '86 the glass oculus had 177 gas jets lighting that.

- [Mark McDonald] Oh boy!

- [Mark Sorenson] Today it's fluorescent tubes behind the glass oculus and a protective layer in between the loose, the glass and the people below.

- [Mark McDonald] Wow!

- [Mark Sorenson] Below that light box is a, another small dome made out of zinc.

And the inside that you can see is in relief 3D and it's painted blue and orange and gold colors.

And this was all that the stained glass was all restored in 1988.

And that's why it's so bright.

- [Mark McDonald] Uh huh!

- [Mark Sorenson] Holding up that inner dome is a Colonnade that looks like granite but it really isn't.

It's a column of brick covered by plaster and horse hair binder, painted or stained and then polished to, in a form called Scagliola to make it look like granite.

- [Mark McDonald] It looks all the more like granite.

- [Mark Sorenson] Right.

And that high up, the higher you go in the Capitol the lighter the building materials are.

- [Mark McDonald] Oh!

- [Mark Sorenson] So at the very top, you're talking about hollow zinc.

Below that terracotta, the brick and then finally heavy stones and masonry.

Each of those columns has got a Corinthian capital and all through the building inside and out, we use, they use the Corinthian capitals as motif.

Now, dropping down below that Colonnade and the walkaround you'll see bronze frieze of historic events.

That bronze frieze is really made out of plaster and painted to look like bronze.

The artist, an Italian named Nikolai, made that in the 1870s for the Capitol, but the construction board ran out of money to complete the Capitol.

So this, everything you see here was completely left naked.

And that bronze frieze was down in the cellar.

(Mark McDonald laughing) - [Mark Sorenson] When Boyington's people came in and they started to redesign the Capitol they found that in the cellar and decided to put it up, but the artist was dead.

And so they did not know exactly which piece went in what place, or exactly sure what each of the topics were.

So most people can identify Lincoln and Douglas and know that's a panel dealing with that.

- [Mark McDonald] Right.

- [Mark Sorenson] But the other cartouches, people have made explanations for in the past but nobody has an absolute guarantee what it is.

- Mark, it seems like all the really great rooms are now committee hearing rooms.

- That's correct.

- And we're in one of them, room 212 which was the original Supreme court.

- That's right.

- Right.

And it has changed some- - Yes.

- But not altogether, has it?

- Right.

This was again, another room that has been restored in the last 10 years.

And the colors are supposed to be exactly the way they were in 1876 when this room opened up with gas lights and seven Supreme Court justices sitting on a platform up in that direction.

Evergreen Studios say these are the greens and pastels and kinda like candy mint colors all through here.

One researcher has said that this is a copy of the ceiling of the Doge's Palace from Venice.

- [Mark McDonald] Wow!

- [Mark Sorenson] Architect of the Capitol, Alfred Piquenard, designed this room and all this is carton pierre plaster moulding, hollow moulding pinned up to the ceiling in these coffered ceilings and all the elements, there are the oak clusters, the bundle of reeds with an axe called the fasces.

All of these are symbols of power and authority of wisdom of a court of law.

So this was the original Supreme court room here until 1908 when they moved out of the Capitol.

And the walls were hand painted justice symbols, and all over the room are medallions of that ilk.

Now I, when I give tours, I always stand here and show above me, this painting that was done in 1876 by an Italian from St. Louis.

And it's the goddess of justice.

And she has a sword of authority and a tablet of laws and a putty with the law book and the American flag (Mark McDonald laughing) and our Capitol in the background.

And she is trampling on a cornucopia of gold coins- - [Mark McDonald] Yes, she is.

- [Mark Sorenson] Because as you know, in Illinois, justice cannot be bought.

- Well, Mark, we're on the main floor, South wing.

And one of the first, if you were to come in that wing, one of the first things you'd see is, is this painting of governor Coles and you really like this piece.

- Yes.

This is a piece I show to all the tour groups from China or Japan or Russia.

This is Edward Coles who lived in Virginia and was a neighbor of Thomas Jefferson.

When he went to William and Mary college, he was convinced that slavery was wrong.

And a professor there got them in contact with President Madison and Edward Coles became James Madison's private secretary in the white house for six years and then was sent to Russia to solve a diplomatic problem.

But in the meantime, he had visited Illinois twice to see what it was like and possibly find a place he could go to free his slaves.

So he is appointed a land sales commissioner for the federal government in Edwardsville and thus brings his slaves from Virginia to Illinois.

But without their knowledge, while they're near Pittsburgh on the Ohio river, he tells his slaves that they are free, if they want to be and can leave to go North or come with him to Illinois, where he will economically set them up with land and a stakeholder.

- [Mark McDonald] Wow!

- [Mark Sorenson] Most of them come to Illinois, probably illegally because he ignores the law that he's perhaps unaware of that requires you to post bond for every black.

And he works as the land sales commissioner and decides that he needs to run for governor in 1822 to make sure Illinois becomes, stays a free state because there's a movement now to make us a slave state even though the Illinois constitution originally said there was no slavery, except for in the saline area of south eastern Illinois, where you could bring a slave in for a year at a time and work.

So the southern element of Illinois, voided slavery.

Coles runs for governor with four candidates.

The vote is split and he wins by about 60 votes to become a minority Governor, immediately addresses the general assemblies and asks them to get of the black code and the anti, the discrimination laws here in Illinois.

The general assembly immediately votes to hold a constitutional convention with the unsaid idea of changing the constitution to make us a slave state.

So for two years, Coles donates his salary and works arduously to defeat the convention and they win by several thousand votes of the 11,000 voters in that year.

After 1824, Coles gets nothing passed.

He's a one term governor.

He finishes up in 1826, stays around for awhile but in the 1830s, he goes to Philadelphia and lives for the rest of his life.

- You know, right next door there's a panel over here.

This just goes to show you never know what you're going to find when you start poking around in old buildings and scraping back layers, do you?

- Right.

So in this wing, the southern wing here on the first floor this has totally been restored.

All the artwork has been restored to what it looked like in 1886.

By that time that even though there were gas lights in the hall, they started putting up large electric lights in certain public areas.

There was a newspaper article that said next to the portraits of the governors in the first floor, they've put up names and that's a good thing because nobody could tell who they were.

(Mark McDonald laughing) So when Evergreen came in and was able to do scrapings, they found that the layers of paint from the 1900s were covering the original paint that had been varnished thus allowing them to scrape down to the original design and cut out some of these things.

And once they had the patterns, they reproduced all of the paintings from 1886, the presidents in this wing and then the wall decoration and the ceiling decoration which were all painted, hand painted by the Phillips and Decorative Company in 1886.

And today are all reproduced by Evergreen in what I would call wallpaper to make it a little more economical.

- We are just on the other side of the wall that we were just looking at at that mural and in what used to be the All War Museum, is that what they called it?

- Right.

- The War Museum.

- This would be the Hall of Flags and the War Museum.

- War Museum.

And now it's all chopped up into- - Right.

- Little pieces.

- This was an example.

So in 1886, this became the War Museum, and this paintings that we're going to see were done.

Ever since that time, at that time, all the elements of the government were in this building.

And now mostly the House and Senate have taken over the public spaces and private rooms.

So this room is now being used as a, as a teleconference room but on this one, these two walls are left the remnants of the battle scenes that were done in 1886 by ET Behr, B-E-H-R. And they show the elements of war, the cavalry and places that were famous for Illinois soldiers participating in the Civil War.

- [Mark McDonald] And these paintings are Behr's paintings.

Some people knew they were here but nobody knew where they were.

- [Mark Sorenson] I used to get quite a few requests of people asking, "Where are the paintings of ET Behr in the Capitol?"

I didn't know that because they were covered with a false ceiling.

Luckily, I saved all those requests in a file.

And so once we found them, I was able to respond to them as well as get information about where the rest of his paintings are in the country to compare them.

- [Mark McDonald] What a find!

Well Mark, if you come in the rotunda and you're not gawking at the dome, one of the first things that you see is this statue of this woman.

- Right.

- It's rather tall, rather sturdy.

It's a good centerpiece, isn't it?

- [Mark Sorenson] Yes.

And it's been here for quite a while.

So in 1895, this was dedicated here thousands of people were in the rotunda.

So we're standing in the rotunda and people used to enter in front of me at the east entrance on the first floor.

And this'll be the first thing they would see after 1895.

Now this statue was a bronze done by Julia Bracken from Illinois.

And she was a student of Lorado Taft.

And in the 1890s, she worked with Taft at the Columbian exhibition, the World's Fair held in Chicago.

And she designed and executed this statue in plaster.

And it was put at the entrance to the Illinois building.

And it was Illinois welcoming the nations.

The governor's wife liked it so much that she, let's say demanded that it be redone and brought to the Capitol.

And so this is the first piece in the Capitol, and right now I think the only piece in the Capitol executed by a woman.

And so it was redone from plaster to bronze.

And it's been here ever since.

- [Mark McDonald] Uh huh!

- [Mark Sorenson] And thousands of people come here each day and have their pictures taken with it and rub the toe.

- [Mark McDonald] They must wonder at that time, what does it signify?

What does she, well, why a woman and why is she dressed that way?

I mean, is she a worker or what is she?

- [Mark Sorenson] I would say that it's a classical maiden, although there's been some apocryphal stories about whose aunt it was used as the model and or what the bar hall girl in Chicago, an entertainer but as far as- - Or was it Monalisa?

Everybody wonders who the heck that was.

- Everybody wants credit for it.

And Bracken was one of, I think, 13 children.

So she has lots of relatives and some of them are still living in Springfield today.

- [Mark McDonald] Really?

- [Mark Sorenson] Yes.

- [Mark McDonald] Mark, when the east entrance was the main entrance and we were just at the rotunda there, if you were looking up, you'd see these three females.

- [Mark Sorenson] Correct.

- [Mark McDonald] And this is the first one.

- [Mark Sorenson] Right.

This is the first one and right now, because of security people don't come in this entrance much anymore.

So hardly anyone looks up and sees these.

This first one is Faith.

And so it's interesting, these were done in probably 1886 with the finishing of the first floor.

And there are two elements.

One, the religious element of taking a Bible verse and executing them in art and two, the Capitol people had already rejected nude women but now 10 years later, they are incorporating them into the Capitol art.

So Faith is a religious, obviously Christian oriented person.

And then we're going to move over to Hope who is in the classical pose of the woman looking out to see hoping that things work out, a foot on the anchor.

And she is a semi-nude.

- [Mark McDonald] Yeah.

- [Mark Sorenson] And then we're going to finish up later on with Charity, a woman who is, looks like she's very willing to give of her gifts and has a cornucopia of food.

- [Mark McDonald] What do you think was going on that allowed them suddenly to decide that it'd be okay to have pictures of nudes on the Capitol ceiling?

- [Mark Sorenson] There is absolutely no documentation of any of the art decisions- (Mark McDonald laughing) in the Capitol.

They've mentioned through correspondence and newspaper articles, several pieces that were either never executed or were executed and are still covered up or were destroyed.

So even with the more restoration in the next 10 years I think we might find some more art.

- [Mark McDonald] How fascinating.

There is no formal guidebook to the art in this building.

And you may have noticed that during the shooting of this story that a lot of the art is still being discovered.

But if you do want to tour it on your own this pamphlet from the Secretary of State will mention many of the art objects, paintings and sculptures.

With another Illinois story in Springfield, I'm Mark McDonald.

Thanks for watching.

(bouncy music) Illinois Stories is brought to you by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Illinois Arts Council Agency, and by the support of viewers like you.

Thank you.