Emil R. Zetter

The official commemorative bronze token pictured above was crafted by artist Emil R. Zettler. Born in Germany, Zettler immigrated to Chicago with his family at the age of four. The bronze medallion depicts Zettler's architectural and sculptural prowess accumulated over years of formal training in Chicago and two of Europe's most prominent academies. At the time of his prominence and the 1933 Chicago World Fair, the scope of global interaction was shifting post-World War I. The official token bears many elements of the Art Deco tradition from the geometric and angular patterns of the background details to the dynamic rendering of the human form. Art Deco as a tradition symbolizes global efforts to embody modernism. The style is a fusion of various artistic movements from Egypt, Paris, and Germany to achieve the global essence of modernity that the Worlds Fairs so sought to embody and inspire. The words "research" and "industry" rest atop the pillars inscribed with the dates "1833" and "1933," the notion of research and industry as inextricable in a modern society becomes evident through the connecting of the two words by the arms of the central male figure.