Remember that little paper clip guy in Microsoft Word? The one that used to bounce around the corner of your screen and ask if you knew how to use the space bar?
His name was "Clippy." He was so universally disliked that even his creators at Microsoft made fun of him. While he wasn't exactly clip art himself, Clippy embodies everything that clip art is: awful, sad and sometimes so infuriating it's hard to do much but laugh.
The use of clip art has been in serious decline since people could snap better photos on their flip phones and started using high-speed internet. We prefer stock images these days. Still, vestiges of clip art can be found on teachers' transparencies, bland corporate notices in break rooms and all sorts of memos written in Comic Sans. Nothing quite says "lame" like clip art.
And there's nothing more apt at misrepresenting a great city like Chicago. People get Chicago wrong all the time. In the movies we're Midwestern bumpkins, in sports we're "Da Bears," in books...wait? Are we ever in books? So we decided to have a little fun and find out how skewed interpretations of Chicago got in the already bizarre world of clip art. Chicago looks predictably clownish.
You poor, poor thing.
The Bean becomes The Noodle.
Chicago puts on an ugly '90s sweater.
Da Bears.
Go, Rose 1!
Nope, not Chicago.
Nice city, never been!
Merry freaking Christmas, from Chicago.
Just a lonely tower in a fart-y cloud.
Chicago is a BUSY place!
Who knew the Hancock was so close to the Sears?
