Charles Turzak's Iconic View of Chicago.

Nice example of Charles Turzak's remarkable pictorial map of Chicago, with original pictorial folder.

This beautiful map of Chicago by Chicago illustrator Charles Turzak, published two years before the Chicago World's Fair and designed to draw the crowds to the "Youthful City of the Big Shoulders."

Design elements (planes, boats, lively and exotic creatures in the lake) draw the eye in and across the panoramic view of the city by the lake, with the World's Fair grounds in the foreground.

Shows events and landmarks during the World's Fair of 1933, including major rivers and other bodies of water, streets, railroads, parks, planes, ships and boats. A table on lower margin, lists the points of interest in Chicago.

Turzak's map is featured in R. Holland's book "Chicago in Maps" pages.

Charles Turzak

Charles Turzak was born August 20, 1899. Turzak learned woodworking from a neighbor and apprenticed making violins. He drew cartoons for his school's yearbook and sale bills for local merchants.

In 1920, Turzak won a cartoon contest sponsored by the Purina Company, which helped him gain admission to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC), graduating in 1924. By the late 1920s, he was producing prints of Northwestern University and Chicago landmarks such as the Chicago Water Tower, Tribune Tower, Buckingham Fountain, as well as watercolors of steel mills, boats, harbors, skylines, woodlands, parks, and still lifes.

Turzak is also well known for his woodcuts and biographies of notable Americans, including Abraham Lincoln and Benjamin Franklin. Turzak exhibited at the Art Institute of Chicago in 1940, and worked for the Works Progress Administration.