The USA's second-largest art museum, the Art Institute, houses a treasure trove from around the globe. The collection of impressionist and postimpressionist paintings is second only to those in France, and the number of surrealist works is tremendous. The Modern Wing dazzles with Picassos and Mirós, while Japanese prints, Grecian urns and stained-glass windows stuff endless rooms beyond.
Must-See Works: Floor 2
The marble halls of this floor are where the majority of highlights hang.
Get close enough to Georges Seurat's A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte (Gallery 240) for the painting to break down into its component dots, and you’ll see why it took the artist two long years to complete his pointillist masterpiece.
The Bedroom (Gallery 241) by Vincent van Gogh depicts the sleeping quarters of the artist’s house in Arles. It’s the second of three versions of the painting, executed during Van Gogh’s 1889 stay at an asylum.
Claude Monet's Stacks of Wheat (Gallery 243) – paintings of the 15-foot-tall stacks by the artist's farmhouse in Giverny – were part of a series that effectively launched his career when they sold like hotcakes at a show he organized in 1891.
Nighthawks (Gallery 262), Edward Hopper's lonely, poignant snapshot of four solitary souls at a neon-lit diner, was inspired by a Greenwich Avenue restaurant in Manhattan.
Grant Wood, a lifelong resident of Iowa, used his sister and his dentist as models for the two stern-faced farmers in his iconic painting American Gothic (Gallery 263).
Must-See Works: Floors 1 & 3
The America Windows (Gallery 144) – huge, blue stained-glass pieces – were created by Marc Chagall to celebrate the USA’s bicentennial. Look for images of the Chicago skyline depicted in the third window from the right.
The elongated figure of The Old Guitarist (Gallery 391) by Pablo Picasso is from the artist’s Blue Period, reflecting not only Picasso’s color scheme but also his experience as a poor, lonely artist in Paris in the early years.
Salvador Dalí's Inventions of the Monsters (Gallery 396) was painted in Austria immediately before the Nazi annexation. The title refers to a Nostradamus prediction that the apparition of monsters presages the outbreak of war. The artist’s profile is visible in the lower left corner, along with that of his wife, Gala.
Other Intriguing Sights
The Thorne Miniature Rooms (Lower Level, Gallery 11) will knock your socks off with their exquisite detail. Peer into 68 teeny-tiny rooms ranging from an 18th-century French salon to a Georgian-era drawing room to a Gothic-style church interior.
In the light-drenched Modern Wing, the contemporary galleries (288–299) burst with iconic works by Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Jasper Johns and more. For an oasis of quiet, seek out the room designed by architect Tadao Ando (Gallery 109), where you walk through a forest of 16 concrete pillars to reach the Japanese screens.
Outdoor Freebies
You can see a fair bit of art without even entering the museum. The north garden has Alexander Calder’s Flying Dragon and other sculptures. The south garden has the Fountain of the Great Lakes by Lorado Taft. Enter both peaceful spaces from Michigan Ave, though note they are closed in winter.
The Stock Exchange Arch, a revered architectural relic, rises up on the museum’s northeast side. The 3rd-floor contemporary sculpture terrace provides cool city views and connects to Millennium Park via the modern, pedestrian-only Nichols Bridgeway.
Lion Sculptures
The beloved lions guarding the entrance may seem identical at first glance, but they actually have different stances, expressions and measurements. Their creator, Edward Kemeys, described the south lion as closely watching something in the distance, while the north lion has its back up and is ready to spring. They’re nice and clean after getting a chemical scrub in summer 2022.
