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Portage Theater
Located at Six Corners in the Portage Park neighborhood of Chicago's Northwest Side, the Portage Theater is one of the oldest movie houses in Chicago. The Portage Theater opened on December 11, 1920 as the Portage Park Theatre (the former name is still visible on the building's facade). Built for the Ascher Brothers circuit with 1,938 seats, the Portage was the first theater built specifically for film (and not vaudeville) in the area. The Portage Theater's interior features a megaphone-shaped auditorium based on a formal Beaux-Arts opera house design. When the theater was taken over by Balaban and Katz in 1940, its marquee, entrance lobby and foyer were redecorated in a sleek, streamlined art deco style to complement other prominent art deco designs at Six Corners such as Sears department store and the Klee Brothers building. The Portage remained a popular fixture of the neighborhood, becoming a second-run movie house in the 1960s. In the 1980s, the theater underwent a dr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Art Deco
Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the United States and Europe during the 1920s and 1930s. Through styling and design of the exterior and interior of anything from large structures to small objects, including how people look (clothing, fashion and jewelry), Art Deco has influenced bridges, buildings (from skyscrapers to cinemas), ships, ocean liners, trains, cars, trucks, buses, furniture, and everyday objects like radios and vacuum cleaners. It got its name after the 1925 Exposition internationale des arts décoratifs et industriels modernes (International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts) held in Paris. Art Deco combined modern styles with fine craftsmanship and rich materials. During its heyday, it represented luxury, glamour, exuberance, and faith in socia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Polish-American Culture In Chicago
Polish Americans ( pl, Polonia amerykańska) are Americans who either have total or partial Polish ancestry, or are citizens of the Republic of Poland. There are an estimated 9.15 million self-identified Polish Americans, representing about 2.83% of the U.S. population. Polish Americans are the second-largest Central European ethnic group after German Americans, and the eighth largest ethnic group overall in the United States. The first Polish immigrants came to the Jamestown colony in 1608, twelve years before the Pilgrims arrived in Massachusetts. Two Polish volunteers, Casimir Pulaski and Tadeusz Kościuszko, led armies in the Revolutionary War and are remembered as American heroes. Overall, around 2.2 million Poles and Polish subjects immigrated into the United States, between 1820 and 1914, chiefly after national insurgencies and famine. They included former Polish citizens of Roman Catholic, Protestant, Jewish or other minority descent. Exact immigration figures are unkn ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Music Venues In Chicago
Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspect of all human societies, a cultural universal. While scholars agree that music is defined by a few specific elements, there is no consensus on their precise definitions. The creation of music is commonly divided into musical composition, musical improvisation, and musical performance, though the topic itself extends into academic disciplines, criticism, philosophy, and psychology. Music may be performed or improvised using a vast range of instruments, including the human voice. In some musical contexts, a performance or composition may be to some extent improvised. For instance, in Hindustani classical music, the performer plays spontaneously while following a partially defined structure and using characteristic motifs. In modal jazz the p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chicago Landmarks
Chicago Landmark is a designation by the Mayor and the City Council of Chicago for historic sites in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Listed sites are selected after meeting a combination of criteria, including historical, economic, architectural, artistic, cultural, and social values. Once a site is designated as a landmark, it is subject to the Chicago Landmarks Ordinance, which requires that any alterations beyond routine maintenance, up to and including demolition, must have their permit reviewed by the Landmarks Commission. Many Chicago Landmarks are also listed on the National Register of Historic Places, providing federal tax support for preservation, and some are further designated National Historic Landmarks, providing additional federal oversight. Criteria The Mayor and the City Council appoint a nine-member Commission on Chicago Landmarks to develop landmark recommendations in accordance with a 1968 Chicago city ordinance. The commission considers areas, dist ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Concert Halls In Illinois
A concert is a live music performance in front of an audience. The performance may be by a single musician, sometimes then called a recital, or by a musical ensemble, such as an orchestra, choir, or band. Concerts are held in a wide variety and size of settings, from private houses and small nightclubs, dedicated concert halls, amphitheatres and parks, to large multipurpose buildings, such as arenas and stadiums. Indoor concerts held in the largest venues are sometimes called ''arena concerts'' or ''amphitheatre concerts''. Informal names for a concert include ''show'' and ''gig''. Regardless of the venue, musicians usually perform on a stage (if not actual then an area of the floor designated as such). Concerts often require live event support with professional audio equipment. Before recorded music, concerts provided the main opportunity to hear musicians play. For large concerts or concert tours, the challenging logistics of arranging the musicians, venue, equipment a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cinemas And Movie Theaters In Chicago
A movie theater (American English), cinema (British English), or cinema hall (Indian English), also known as a movie house, picture house, the movies, the pictures, picture theater, the silver screen, the big screen, or simply theater is a building that contains auditoria for viewing films (also called movies) for entertainment. Most, but not all, movie theaters are commercial operations catering to the general public, who attend by purchasing a ticket. The film is projected with a movie projector onto a large projection screen at the front of the auditorium while the dialogue, sounds, and music are played through a number of wall-mounted speakers. Since the 1970s, subwoofers have been used for low-pitched sounds. Since the 2010s, the majority of movie theaters have been equipped for Digital cinema#Digital projection, digital cinema projection, removing the need to create and transport a physical film stock#Intermediate and print stocks, film print on a heavy reel. A great ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Art Deco Architecture In Illinois
Art is a diverse range of human activity, and resulting product, that involves creative or imaginative talent expressive of technical proficiency, beauty, emotional power, or conceptual ideas. There is no generally agreed definition of what constitutes art, and its interpretation has varied greatly throughout history and across cultures. In the Western tradition, the three classical branches of visual art are painting, sculpture, and architecture. Theatre, dance, and other performing arts, as well as literature, music, film and other media such as interactive media, are included in a broader definition of the arts. Until the 17th century, ''art'' referred to any skill or mastery and was not differentiated from crafts or sciences. In modern usage after the 17th century, where aesthetic considerations are paramount, the fine arts are separated and distinguished from acquired skills in general, such as the decorative or applied arts. The nature of art and related concepts, such ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lincoln Avenue (Chicago)
Lincoln Avenue is a street of the north side of city of Chicago. It runs from Clark Street (itself a diagonal) on the western border of Lincoln Park largely to the northwest, ending in Morton Grove, Illinois. It leaves the city limits of Chicago at Devon Avenue, through the village of Lincolnwood, curves through the village of Skokie and ends at Dempster Street in Morton Grove. In total distance it is about long, although it is not completely continuous. Between Foster Avenue and Skokie Boulevard U.S. Route 41 runs on Lincoln Avenue. Most of Lincoln Avenue is zoned commercial, and is lined by shops, restaurants and other establishments. It is the site of the yearly Taste of Lincoln Avenue, held between Fullerton Avenue and Wrightwood Avenue. It is also the site of the Maifest and German American Fest in Lincol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Biograph Theater
The Biograph Theater on Lincoln Avenue in the Lincoln Park neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois, was originally a movie theater but now presents live productions. It gained early notoriety as the location where bank robber John Dillinger was leaving when he was shot down by FBI agents, after he watched a gangster movie there on July 22, 1934. The theater is on the National Register of Historic Places and was designated a Chicago Landmark on March 28, 2001. History Designed by architect Samuel N. Crowen in 1914, the Biograph has many of the distinguishing characteristics of movie houses of the period, including a storefront-width lobby, recessed entrance, free-standing ticket booth, and canopy marquee. The building is finished with red pressed brick and white- glazed terra cotta. On July 22, 1934, after attending the film ''Manhattan Melodrama'' with brothel madam Ana Cumpănaș, also known as Anna Sage (or "The Woman in Red"), and Polly Hamilton, John Dillinger was shot dead ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Dillinger
John Herbert Dillinger (June 22, 1903 – July 22, 1934) was an American gangster during the Great Depression. He led the Dillinger Gang, which was accused of robbing 24 banks and four police stations. Dillinger was imprisoned several times and escaped twice. He was charged with but not convicted of the murder of an East Chicago, Indiana, police officer, who shot Dillinger in his bullet-proof vest during a shootout; it was the only time Dillinger was charged with homicide. Dillinger courted publicity. The media ran exaggerated accounts of his bravado and colorful personality, and cast him as a Robin Hood. In response, J. Edgar Hoover, director of the Bureau of Investigation (BOI), used Dillinger as a campaign platform to evolve the BOI into the Federal Bureau of Investigation, developing more sophisticated investigative techniques as weapons against organized crime.Elliott J. Gorn, ''Dillinger's Wild Ride: The Year That Made America's Public Enemy Number One'' (2009), p 101. A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Public Enemies (2009 Film)
''Public Enemies'' is a 2009 American biographical crime drama film directed by Michael Mann, who co-wrote the screenplay with Ronan Bennett and Ann Biderman. It is an adaptation of Bryan Burrough's 2004 non-fiction book ''Public Enemies: America's Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933–34''. Set during the Great Depression, the film chronicles the final years of the notorious bank robber John Dillinger (Johnny Depp) as he is pursued by FBI agent Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale), Dillinger's relationship with Billie Frechette (Marion Cotillard), as well as Purvis' pursuit of Dillinger's associates and fellow criminals John "Red" Hamilton (Jason Clarke), Homer Van Meter (Stephen Dorff), Harry Pierpont (David Wenham) and Baby Face Nelson (Stephen Graham). Burrough originally intended to make a television miniseries about the Depression-era crime wave in the United States, but decided to write a book on the subject instead. Mann developed the project, and some scenes we ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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