The Chicago Picasso: The Sculpture Nobody Wanted and Everyone Now Loves

On August 15, 1967, a 50-foot, 162-ton sculpture of cor-ten steel was unveiled in the Civic Center Plaza at 50 W Washington Street — renamed Daley Plaza in 1976 — and the people of Chicago promptly hated it. Pablo Picasso had donated the work to the city, refusing to accept any payment, and it was fabricated by US Steel in Gary, Indiana. Nobody knew what it depicted. Picasso offered no explanation at the time. Aldermen publicly questioned the sanity of placing an incomprehensible foreign sculpture in front of City Hall. Suggestions as to the subject ranged from a baboon to an Afghan hound to a woman's face to a Cubist self-portrait. Alderman John Hoellen proposed replacing it with a statue of Ernie Banks. Mayor Richard J. Daley, to his considerable credit, kept the sculpture. Within a year, it had become a civic touchstone. Children slid down its curved base. It appeared on Chicago ashtrays, postcards, and tourist mugs. Politicians who had condemned it stopped mentioning that they had done so. Today it is arguably the most beloved piece of public art in Chicago — the anchor of a plaza where workers eat lunch, protesters gather, and the city's Christkindlmarket sets up each winter. It is known simply as "The Picasso."