Studio: international art (21.1901)

Studio- Talk

external features of the ornamentation, but includes
a complete realisation of the whole tendency of the
scheme, as expressed, not by detail alone, but far
more by the proportions of the entire building, by
the distribution and the effect of the distances.

Thus qualified, Gabriel Seidl approached the
task of creating, for the treasures of many centu-
ries, collected during many decades, a home which
was not only to afford them shelter, but was to
restore them to new artistic life. Being intimately
acquainted, from his youth up, with the collections
in the Museum, his first object was to display
everything in such a way as to suggest what its
effect must once have been in everyday life. Most
museums representative of applied art and civilisa-
tion—and to this class the Bavarian National
Museum belongs by reason of its aim and scope—
take the form of herbaria. Seidl's idea was to
create a garden, and what he proposed to do he
has done. He did not erect a gigantic building,
rising symmetrically, and revealing a uniform style ;
instead, he created a picturesque group of build-
ings of different heights and various styles, sur-
rounded by courts and gardens—apparently a very
loose-jointed and, so to speak, polyglot scheme,
whereon, however, is impressed the stamp of com-
plete unity as to the exterior, while internally,
thanks to its admirably clear and practical sub-
division, it gives the impression of a living
organism.

Leaving the turrets and the central portion
out of the question, the whole edifice is re-
stricted in elevation to a lofty ground floor, with
one additional floor. A portion of the basement
will, however, be used as a museum. A number
of peasants' rooms will be arranged there, and on
the second story of the middle block an attractive
and interesting collection of small plastic figures,
representing the birth of Christ the adoration of
the Magi, &c, has found a place. The ground
floor contains collections illustrative of the advance
of civilisation, displayed in forty-eight rooms, each
depicting a certain epoch in characteristic detail,
and its general style. Herein Seidl has displayed
in an astonishing degree his wealth of ideas, his
knowledge of Bavarian architecture, his inventive
genius and his poetic force—all revealed in masterly
crescendo and decrescendo, beginning quite simply
with prehistoric collections and Roman antiquities
discovered on Bavarian soil, advancing through the
severe earnestness of the Romantic and the stiff
beauty of the Gothic periods to the all-prevailing
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glamour of the Renaissance, to the pompous
development of the splendours of the sovereign
princes of the seventeenth and eighteenth cen-
turies ; then gliding into the simple grace and
elegance of the homely tranquillity of Louis XVI.,
and- the coldly classic tendency of the first decades
of the nineteenth century.

Passing through these rooms one seems to be,
not in a museum, but in the castle of some prince
who is devoted to art and antiquities, precious
objects and curios, and collects them, not because
he is possessed by a passion for collecting, but
because he takes delight in beauty of every kind.
The outlook from the windows, which open either
on to snug gardens or the broad green expanse of
the great park, known as the " English Garden,"
completes the illusion that we are strolling through
a princely domain, far from the turmoil of a big
city. Nor is this impression lost as we ascend to
the upper storey, containing the special collections.
The various rooms, thirty-four in number, filled
with iron-work and the products 01 the goldsmith's
art, with textile industries, glass and ceramics,
etc., etc., again and again present new and
harmonious ensembles, thanks to the beautiful sub-
division of space, the ever-varying decoration of
ceilings and walls, and the skilful disposition of the
show-cases.

Quite apart from South Kensington—which is,
of course, hors concours—there are other museums
containing larger and more valuable collections
than that of Bavaria, but surely there is none
which affords the beholder so much cesthetic
delight. One feels a true pleasure at the sight of
all these rare and beautiful things, which effectively
disposes of the objections—often justly urged—to
the modern museum system. Neither the Musee
Cluny in Paris, nor the Germanic Museum of
Niirnberg, nor the Swiss Museum in Zurich is
altogether so satisfying as that which I have briefly
described, interesting as each and all of them may
be.

It should be said that Gabriel Seidl has had an
indefatigable assistant in the sympathetic and
gifted Rudolf Seitz, who, by his distribution of the
objects in the new rooms, rounded off the artistic
work of the architect. Both artists have created a
life-work which will remain after they are gone,
and be a joy to many generations to come.

G. K.