The Midway Gardens Sprites have an exceptional tail of beginnings, controversy, seemingly endings and mysterious rebirths. Frank Lloyd Wright commissioned these fascinating garden statues for the Midway Gardens in Chicago, Illinois. At the time Wright had left his Oak Park residence, his studio and his wife and ventured off to a new place, the Taliesin East, with his new found love. He hired Italian sculpture, Alfonso Iannelli, to create two Sprites that would eventually become part of a great American tail of art history and a story of love that never died.
Soon after the creation of the Sprites there was conflict between Wright and Ianneli over who should take credit for the design of the very popular statues. Although it is clear from the letters sent between the two great artists that neither had complete creative control over these spectacular creations, the two men quarreled for many years and never worked together again.
A twist of fate and bad timing would soon bring the Midway Gardens Sprites to an seemingly early end. The Midway Gardens opened shortly before prohibition. The club would not survive. The club transferred through many owners for different business purposes until it was ruthlessly destroyed to make way for a parking lot. A very insightful man saw the two statues about to be laid waste in the lake and was compelled to salvage them. This inspired act preserved the Sprites for years at a private residence until the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation found them. Rescued and restored, the Sprites became reawakened to first a few historians and art enthusiasts. Soon later the Midway Gardens Sprites would find there way into the hearts and minds of both Americans and patrons worldwide. The intriguing story of the Sprites does not end there; much more is found in the love affair Wright found with his art and most assuredly with his new found love Mamah.
Martha (Mamah) Borthwick and Wright first met when Wright was hired to build a home for Edwin Cheney in 1905. Over many years a relationship developed between Wright and Martha and both left their spouses to pursue this sparkling relationship. Thwart with scandal they both suffered deeply for following their hearts. Wright was in Chicago when he received the news of Mamah's tragic death at Taliesin. Overcome with grief Wright refused to have anyone touch Mamah's body. He had a simple wooden casket made and buried her at Taliesin. He never marked the site of her grave.
Like the Sprites, Wrights love had appeared to have been lost. When asked about why he did not want to have a gravestone he commented "Why mark the site of something so ended". Perhaps Wright thought as many know that love never dies; it lives forever. While those we love pass and we fall into unexplained circumstances that life sometimes show for us, we know with all of our being that there is no end. The Sprites seam to have embodied this sentiment of our human experience. While those we love may take unexpected exits from our experience we know they live forever.