The Art of the Exposition | Page 8

but anybody at all familiar with the development of modern architecture abroad will always think of Boberg as the greatest living master of Swedish architecture. His very talented wife, Anna Boberg, is equally well represented in another department, that of the Fine Arts.
The plan of the Swedish building is unsymmetrical, but well balanced, nevertheless. The typical northern wood tower, at one side, has a very fine outline, and like the roof, has a very fine decorative shingle covering, interesting in pattern as well as in color. I am very much tempted to speak of the treasures found inside of this building, but we must go on to Denmark's building.
This building, situated near the southern end of the Fine Arts Colonnade, has a far more advantageous location than the Swedish building. Situated on a narrow tongue of triangular shape, the architect has taken the fullest advantage of this original piece of ground. The building gives a very good idea of some of the very best tendencies in the modern art of Europe, without being bizarre, like some recent American attempts, in the most wrongly labeled of all art expressions - the "Art Nouveau."
The Norwegian building, somewhat remotely situated, back of the French building and near the Presidio entrance, has very much in common with the Swedish building, and offers the same attractive features of wood and stone construction as the building representing its sister state. Historical traditions and everything else are so much alike in these two countries that it must not surprise one to find the two buildings have so many points of interest in common.
The north of Europe has given to the world many very excellent and genuine expressions of architecture, which, owing to their fine constructive qualities, have been absorbed wherever wood is the principal building material. The art contributions of Sweden, Norway, and Denmark will long remain in the memory of all Exposition visitors.
Holland makes considerable pretensions as to originality of style in a curiously incongruous creation at the north of the Fine Arts Palace. During the last twenty years a peculiarly inadaptable type of building has been developed in Holland by a group of younger architects. Many of these buildings are suggestive of stone rather than of brick construction, and they do not fit in very well into the architectural traditions of the Dutch - builders traditionally of the finest brick structures in the world.
The Holland building at the Exposition is not typical of that great and independent people. It looks cheap and has all the faults of the Art Nouveau, which has, unfortunately, been much discredited, by just such things in our own country, where classical traditions are so firmly and so persistently entrenched.
While structurally this building is of a peculiar, affected, ultra-modern note, the general scheme of decoration inside as well as outside compels much praise. The general feeling of refinement, of serenity, that so strongly characterizes the interior is due to the able work of Hermann Rosse, a capable decorator-painter, who designed and supervised the entire color scheme.
The color scheme inside the Holland building, while daring, is most original in using an unusual combination of steel-blue and warm grey silver tones. These two relatively cold notes are enhanced in a complementary color sense by touches of orange and yellow. A constructive stencil pattern based on the two national plants of Holland, the orange tree and the tulip, add richness to the general effect. Mr. Rosse's very decorative wall painting opposite the main entrance represents the Industries of Peace. While somewhat severe, it adds dignity in motive as well as in treatment.
On the outside some fine decorative tile panels reflect one of the chief industries of the Dutch and also tell of the influence that Dutch art has long received from Holland's East Indian possessions. These tile panels are very decorative. To us, out here, they suggest artistic ceramic possibilities for architectural purposes of which we have taken little advantage. Considering the fact that we have quantities of good clay and that so much original good decorative design is lying idle, this inactivity in architectural ceramics in California is distressing. So far as I know, Batchelder, in Pasadena, still has the monopoly on architectural tiles for the entire Pacific coast.
Other European countries besides Holland are interestingly represented. The Italian building is a dignified building of pure Florentine Renaissance lines, with here and there a modern note.
This should rather be called a group of buildings, since it is a combination of some of the finest bits of Italian Renaissance architecture. The architects of this building succeeded admirably in giving a feeling of antiquity to the general treatment of the whole arrangement, which, under the blue sky of California, brings one straight back into the land of sunshine and artistic tradition. The whole arrangement of this