The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, June 3, 1900, Page 10

10 THE SUNDAY CALL. - RIGICS PRONOUNCE OUR ONGRESSIONAL LIBRARY ' ‘BHE GREABESE EXAMPLE OF AMERICAN ARCHITECTURE. The mural decorations are happy and ous In the rotunda. Agalnst a high mo- Greece and Rome the sculptors and decs brave with the glow of the sun in thelr Saic wall are painted his twelve figures orators have gone for classical forms, and thought. representing twelve countries that have the types stand for the best in the art of The corridor south of this hall is In the ages. 7 sharp contrast. It is quiet and th in charge of the funds used every htful Th - effort to get the best wc money would buy—or at money in hand woul Such name: Kenyon Cox, Garrl Gutherz are among and suggestive more of memory than of prgmise. This corridor is dedicated to the poets, and the work of H. O. Walker is predominant The reading om, which occuples the butlding, s less gorgeous ance and more massive in s line it; the reds of of Siena, all toned m shadows of the Tenn- essee store. Six figures, great in history, of the galle: they great teachers, be- d leading down the £ St. Paul and Solon to walls. It was wonderful to fleld working on the c Ladders were arranged for another, for it was a long tr of duty., Hi folds b be shifted as tnspired the are six of t ginning with STAIRWw AN, VIENVED given greatr gimts to civilization. Egypt stands for written records and Judea for reilgion. Greece typifies philosophy, Rome administration. Islam for physics, Epain for discovery, and so on to our own America, which stands to the world as the leader in science. The wings of these fig- ures overlap and form a great circle just below the ceiling. Above them fldats the figure of Human Understanding. Her veil is 1ifted and she is looking onward toward the achieve- t ta be. Two cherubs attend her, the bock of knowledge and wisdom, the other beckoning those below to reach upward to the heights that his gulding spirit is atraining, wander alrug inlald floors, Postoffice and Agriculture, with the seal of the United States for a climax. This task did not look like a tempting one when Mr. Van Ingen, the decorator, be- gan. It appeared to be hampered by nec- esary conventionality of form. But al- though he could not give the loose retn to fancy that some of the library’s other artists were aliowed, he sought and found a lavish color scheme makes the pa- villon warm and glowing and vivid in epite of its formal theme. Bronze gilding catches lights and shac and somehow the pea worked Into these lights an they flash out In glimmes gold and violet and blue. How was It done? Mr. Ingen knows From the rotunda where the desks are and where the book 1 to the farther corner of the vilion—all is bea farthest pa- all is hopeful, all REAPING RooMm G v BAALLERy % Fven so, they cannot be half appreciated Is complete. America has at last a work The er z s and floor with every nook and corner of it complete ot bis coluimns. Bow, will not sppartunities B ndssd for from the room below. of art that will go to the making of tradi~ rise o il they ch the work of younger artists yet to rise? The pavilion which fits into the north- tion. S vy s Becoratibng SF this Sntinsiiiiics e east corner of the Greek cross Is called et blossom f the most part the work of Philip Martiny. the Pavilion of the Seals. Various seals In an office b ng in Chicago a 25- are carried out in the panel designs: the pound janitor is called “Cherudb,” and an seals of the Departments of the Interior, elevator boy whose weight is 105 is known Navy, War, Treasury. State. Justice, as "Ox.” e designed the bronze torchbearers of the newel posts. Every effect of the hall . ds to the one conception of splendor, of t magnificence, which has been REcEPTION - Room ... through long corridors, and pasc numDber- less works of art before you realize what the bullding as a whole means, what Its plan really is, After all, it 1s as simple as true American things always are. The whole outline is that of a rectangle with a Greek cross within; the cross’ center is the reading room, three of its arms are used as book stacks, the fourth is the famous entrance. Pavilions fit into the four corners between the arms of the ' cross, and these pavilions hcld some of | . | I | the rarest gems of art in the whole build- ing. Inside the decorations age lavishly elaborate; outside the walls are beautifully plain, and only the elaborate fountain at the entrance gives hint of the splendor within. Here Perry’s court of Neptune shows what sea fun must have been 1i in the days when tugging bathing sults and mufiling oil cloth caps were superflui- ties and when sea horses plunged to make gport of Neptune's followers. Throughout the library the classical . £cheme has been carried out. Mr. Elmer TS E. Garnsey has the whole charge of the y = decoration, and he is reported to have sald that “what was good enough for Raphael and Michael Angelo s good : enough for the buildings of to-day.” Our tance of seventy-two feet, and not one carried out in architecture and decora- Fulton, Newton and Henry. Religion &nd age has developed no manner of its own,’ ne wrought out his desi{gns of Literaturs, wrch, one column, one panel of all this tion. The great inlaid bragen sun in the sclence form the symbolical statues of the and Garnsey has not seen fit to carry out Belence, History and Art. They are far <=st hall is unfinishec. That involves the floor is part of the scheme, the glittering plers’ entablatures. the whims of the time which seem to be above the galleries of the reading room Bne afiverse criticism that hes been made: white marble and the high lights are part. Blashfield's work s the most consplcu- only ephemeral. So back to the art of and the size of the figures is tremendous.