Traffic-stopper: Public displays of the works of Lake Forest watercolorist Mark McMahon are common. His tiled murals adorn walls from the American Airlines terminal at O’Hare International Airport and a State of Illinois building in Des Plaines to McDonald’s in Lake Forest. Now his work is stopping traffic.
Those are his drawings of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and its traders that have been taking shape on the very visible Bigsby & Kruthers “mural building” at the Kennedy Expressway and Ashland Avenue at the North Avenue exit.
When contacted about the to-do, McMahon admitted to being the culprit. “I just got off the phone with a friend who called from his car. He was stuck in traffic on the Kennedy. He said, `Mark, is this you slowing down traffic here? We’re at a standstill.’ “
Among the Merc’s characters that McMahon is portraying is another well-known Lake Countian, former Merc Chairman Jack Sandner of Lake Bluff.