. Exposition universelle, 1900 : the chefs-d'uvre. ourse of a serious examination of the architectural featuresof the Exposition, while admitting that the general plan of the structure isopen to criticism, says: It nevertheless bears witness to the brilliantqualities of its author, and it is wanting in but little to be writer in the Dehats, M. Babin, declares: If there should remain onlyone defender of the Porte Monumentale, I will be that one. If it wereonly so as not to imitate the inelegant conduct of those who, having giventhe commission to M. Rene Binet, approved the plan
. Exposition universelle, 1900 : the chefs-d'uvre. ourse of a serious examination of the architectural featuresof the Exposition, while admitting that the general plan of the structure isopen to criticism, says: It nevertheless bears witness to the brilliantqualities of its author, and it is wanting in but little to be writer in the Dehats, M. Babin, declares: If there should remain onlyone defender of the Porte Monumentale, I will be that one. If it wereonly so as not to imitate the inelegant conduct of those who, having giventhe commission to M. Rene Binet, approved the plans, praised it in thewater-color sketch, in the maquette, in the scaffoldings, until the hourwhen abuse began to be rained upon it and upon its author. And then,also, because, all things taken into consideration, it really pleases , in the Figaro, devotes a column to the statue on the summit:Who is, then, this Parisienne, in sortie dc bat, who invites us to enter PRINCIPAL ENTRANCE TO THE PALACE OFSCIENCES, ARTS. AND LETTERS PHOTOGRAVURE. ARCHITECTURE in the dance ? Why is she so well shapedand set up, in a provocative pose, on theball which supports her and under thegalley v/hich serves her for a bonnet?She is throned among the stars. She liftsher nose proudly. She struts, like thebourgeois who have carriages and horses,and who intend that we shall know from all idealism, she superintendsthe distribution of the tickets, inexchange for which we obtain of the household, shelooks* after the prosperity ofher establishment. Filled withthe sense of her own impor-tance, she rules from on high, likea goddess. Is she, then, our latestfetich, the Palladium of our city,the Madonna of the new era, Notre-Dame du Tourniquet? Still anotherof these commentators, M. Hallays,carries this irreverent idea further:At the summit, like a cup-and-ballreversed, the symbolic statue of theParisienne makes to the gapingloungers below a strange, but by nomeans equivocal, gest
Size: 1246px × 2005px
Photo credit: © The Reading Room / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., boo, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectart, bookyear1900
