The Sculpture and Mural Decorations of the Exposition - A Pictorial Survey of the Art of the Panama-Pacific international exposition by Stella George Stern Perry
page 58 of 93 (62%)
page 58 of 93 (62%)
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a triumphant pageant. In "The Triumph of the Field," Man sits upon the
skeleton head of a steer, surrounded by a multitude of symbols indicative of festivals of agricultural success in the past. Some are pagan, some Christian. Above his head is the wheel of an antique wagon; he holds crude farm implements of long-past days. In "Abundance," the companion piece, Nature, a female figure, sits in the prow of a ship, surrounded by the abundance of land and sea. Her hands are extended; one, in order to receive greatly; the other, that she may greatly give. Worship Altar of Fine Arts Rotunda This lovely, adoring figure, pure, devoted, appealing, emblematic of Art Tending the Fires of Inspiration, is placed upon the Altar before the Palace of Fine Arts and can be seen only from across the waters of the lagoon. Her perfect self-surrender to her holy task of guarding inspiration's flame is a sermon and a poem. She is the worshipful spirit for whose reward the glow of genius is sent. She is an image of the perfect reverence for an ideal. It is interesting to note that she is by the same hand that fashioned those rugged laborers on the portals of the Palace of Varied Industries, that of Ralph Stackpole. The altar of Fine Arts, separated from the beholder by the whole width of the beautiful lagoon, set before the great rotunda and surrounded by sculptured barriers and growing green buttress walls of flowers that quite shut it off from all access of the passerby, has the effect of a shrine. This sense of seclusion adds much to the impressiveness of the statue. |
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