In the summer of 1998, Angela Dahl came up with an idea that she thought might help both her brother and her cause. Dahl had been a volunteer on the junior board of Ronald McDonald House in Hyde Park for two years, and she was helping plan the organization’s fall benefit. When she suggested at a meeting that a collage by her younger brother Adam would make a good silent auction item, she got an enthusiastic response.
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Nevertheless he agreed, and to meet the deadline he submitted a photograph of a finished work and promised the highest bidder a similar collage, to be titled Cityscape. It would feature hundreds of photographs of different faces juxtaposed with images of Chicago landmarks. The sample photo and description were displayed at the event, held at Cafe Brauer in the Lincoln Park Zoo. There were almost 300 people in attendance. “It was the kind of event where you were expected to get ten of your friends to attend,” says Angela. “So everyone knew everyone else.” Even so, she didn’t know the purchaser of Cityscape.
Interested, perhaps for the first time ever, in how much money his work had brought in, Adam called his sister the next morning to hear what the winning bid had been. “I was a little embarrassed to tell him,” she says. “I’d guessed that it would go for much higher–but it was from a photo, after all, and it wasn’t the actual piece.” Cityscape sold for about $150. If Adam was disappointed he got over it, and about two months later the piece arrived from Denver. Angela, who recognized the handwriting on the package, didn’t even bother to unwrap it. “I remember phoning the winner and telling the person that it would be left with my doorman.” The collage was picked up, and Dahl didn’t think about it again.
“At one point we were trying to figure out how to get the mailing list for the event, and I remembered that Sherri had been in charge of the mailing list that year,” says Dahl. Finally this spring her friend Sherri McGinnis, a Ronald McDonald House board member, supplied Dahl with the names and addresses of people who attended the event. She also gave her another reason for hope. “She said, ‘I think I know who purchased it,’ and she left her a message asking her to call me.”
