THE ARTS BUILDING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVIII, Issue 17889, 17 September 1921, Page 10

THE ARTS BUILDING.

Sir, was ,surprised ) '-to 1 read m -the! Saturday's issue of your journal, ft venom- • 0113 attack on the accepted design of tm, Arts Building of Auds;l»rid Umytoaty College. " The writer m Building, the Syd- j ney ■ journal from which the article ,is j quoted, adopts a tons that is strongly* surest! of person?,! feeling rather than caim judgment. Such phrases as abomination,' absurdity," " latest freak," ."the c rudeuess of a child with a so; of building blocks," " tulips called . gable,. ends, ' "hideous tower, and other coarse abuse must convey to the mind of any dispassionate person an impression of malice. W'a« this anonymous slanderer a disap- j pointed competitor? He seems to have j overlooked the fact that his insults are levelled even mora directly against Professor Wilkinson, of the Sydney University. and the two leading New Zealand architects who were associated with _ him, thin, against the architects who designed the building, because _ the assessors had perfect freedom of choice from among n)?ward* of thirty designs submitted in the competition. However, my purpose in writing is not to repel an attack whichlitis defeated itself by its rancour, but to say that I have recently had an opportunity for inspecting Newman College, at Melbourne University, which the writer in Building describes as an " abomination foisted on the Melbourne public," I spent some time with the Dean of the College inspecting tie building, inside and out, and I have ho hesitation in saying that, wttffl completed, it wili ba one of the ;.nost boai'tilul homes of learning in Australia. Only one division of a block has so far been erected, but its charm enables one to visualise the harmonious and inspired conception which will take concrete fcra when the design oi the architects has reached completion. Mr. Roger Fry, in a secern address at the Royal Institute of British Architects, observed that " aesthetic beauty iia a building is essentially the same as that pi sculpture. It results from the expression of a plastic idea." He added ; " English architecture does not express plastic ideas, but his-torico-social ideas. It is founded upon social snobbery." Now, what the architects of Newman College and Auckland University College buildings have succeeded in doing is to express in concrete form a lofty conception of the intellectual aims to which these buildings will be devoted. I can easily understand that any architectural design which possessed the essence of spirituality will make no appeal to >1 sordid mind, hide-bound in the shackles of conventionality, such as the -writer in "Building obviously possesses; but to men like Professor Wilkinson, whoss experience covers & wide range of achie r eTnerit in architecture, ancient and modern, and who is gifted with, imagination, the design selected for the Auckland Arts Kuilding appeals instinctively, ■ and its choicts will be fully justiSsd by the verdict of men of culture. Geo. H. Wilson.