With the demise of pay phones, I’m glad to see one depicted in the Art Institute of Chicago’s collection.
This artwork appeared randomly in the Chrome extension, “Art Tab”. Every time I open a new Chrome tab, it shows a random artwork from the Art Institute of Chicago’s collection.
I tried to find more artwork featuring pay phones in the Art Institute of Chicago’s collection by googling “pay phone” and “art institute of chicago”. Despite none coming up, there was an interesting result.
Phone numbers for pay phones at the Art Institute of Chicago
In the Google results was an old, and I mean old, webpage listing all the phone numbers for the pay phones at the museum:
Certainly, there are no pay phones in the museum anymore, right? I might call all these numbers to see what they are used for now.
Side-note: speaking of pay phones…
Years ago, I did a series of artworks on pay phones, “Call to God“.
When I visited a town, I would look up if any Armed Forces soldiers from that town had died in service. I would then write a prayer for the family on a sticky note and leave it on a pay phone.
Shawn Pahnke passed away on June 16, 2003 (per themilitarytimes.com). The Chicago Tribune wrote a tear-jerking story a couple weeks later. When I posted this image in 2009, his wife, Elisha Pahnke, found the image on Flickr and commented:
I am Elisha Pahnke. I just came across this. I don’t know what to say except thank you for your thoughts and prayers.
Their son would now be 23 years old. I wonder what he’s up to. I know one thing. This June 16th, I will be flying our American flag.