Pleasure Dome
REED, HENRY HOPE
Pleasure Dome By Henry Hope Reed No image is more frequently seen on television than the United States Capitol. Day after day, night after night, it is there—behind a reporter, a...
...This last is seen, on a giant scale, in “The Apotheosis of Washington,” placed at the center of the great dome...
...Decoration is found not just on the walls, but on the ceilings and floors...
...The West is lucky to have two key public buildings that have, in every way, repelled fashion and remained loyal to tradition...
...How about the Brandenburger Tor...
...The construction here took place in the 1850s, shortly after the completion of most of the work across the sea...
...There is also plenty of sculpture, though not as plentiful as in London, and an abundance of frescoes, where the American building has the edge...
...The Kremlin represents Russia...
...But whereas the English palace is wholly Gothic, our Capitol is thoroughly Classical...
...Berlin...
...Henry Hope Reed is president of Classical America...
...Not often is the seat of a legislature a national symbol...
...One glimpse of the famous clocktower, with its bell, Big Ben, and we know that the story pertains to England...
...Not to be overlooked either is the Capitol’s painted and molded work—the Senate wing boasting more of the painted, the House more of the molded...
...At a distance, few realize that the fresco is over 3,000 square feet...
...When the East Front of the Capitol was expanded in the early 1960s, a corridor was created on the ground floor for a much-used visitors’ space...
...The Reichstag in Berlin, the Palazzo Montecitorio in Rome, the Palais Bourbon in Paris...
...Let us hope that it goes no further...
...It is well worth looking beyond their shells to realize that ornament is everywhere— not just in paintings, but in statues, reliefs, and polychromy, in carved wood and plaster detail...
...So too with the extension of the Capitol, as far as this country was concerned...
...That is the picture that best identifies the nation...
...And that the Capitol continues to stand gloriously Classical, while Westminster stands gloriously Gothic...
...Treasury let us down when, with the new 100-dollar bill, it opted for visual nihilism...
...Seldom is a statue—even a colossus— the symbol of a nation...
...Peter’s...
...Paris is represented by the Arc de Triomphe and the Eiffel Tower, Rome by St...
...In their design, the architects made use of massive Doric columns and Doric detail, thus preserving harmony with the older parts of the building—a rare recent example of public architecture executed in the Classical...
...Can anyone recognize other legislative buildings...
...The U.S...
...Only one other seems to have as prominent a place: the New Palace of Westminster in London...
...And in America, the Capitol is number one...
...Day after day, night after night, it is there—behind a reporter, a politician, an anchorman...
...Usually, the view is confined to the Capitol’s massive dome...
...It has left in the dust an equally vivid image: the Statue of Liberty...
...One finds hardly a trace of it in either place, which is astonishing in a world awash in modernism...
...In London, most of this work was executed after the disastrous fire of 1834 (which explains the official name “New Palace of Westminster...
...Yet a third factor links the Capitol and its British cousin: Neither has been touched by modern art...
...The ceilings and floors are paved in the same encaustic tile (known as Minton) as at Westminster...
...One thinks of “Mother Russia,” outside of Volgograd, but this statue (also a colossus) remains relatively unfamiliar...
...Aside from their status as symbols, the Capitol and Westminster share the distinction of being two of the most lavishly decorated buildings of their kind...
...His book on the United States Capitol will appear next year...
...The post-fire reconstruction must have been one of the most important undertakings, not just in architecture, but in all the arts in the England of the last century...
...in documentaries, sitcoms, and movies...
Vol. 1 • July 1996 • No. 42
