In the main, this volume consists of articles originally published in
the San Francisco BULLETIN. It includes material gathered from many
visits to the Exposition grounds and from many talks with men concerned
in the organization and the building and ornamentation. The brief
history that forms the Introduction gives an account of the development.
For me, as, I presume, for most people, the thing done, no matter how
interesting it may he, is never so interesting as the doing of the
thing, the play of the forces behind. Even in the talk with the
architect, where the finished Exposition itself is discussed, I have
tried to keep in mind those forces, and wherever I could to indicate
their play.
The dialogue form I have used for several reasons: it is easy to follow;
it gives scope for more than one kind of opinion; and it deals with the
subject as we all do, when with one friend or more than one we visit the
Exposition grounds. It has been my good fortune to he able to see the
Exposition from points of view very different from my own and much
better informed and equipped. I am glad to pass on the advantage.
The Exposition is generally acknowledged to be an achievement
unprecedented. Merely to write about it and to try to convey a sense of
its quality is a privilege. I have valued it all the more because I know
that many people, not trained in matters of architecture and art, are
striving to relate themselves to the expression here, to understand it
and to feel it in all its hearings. If, at times, directly or in
indirectly, I have been critical, the reason is that I wished, in so far
as I could, to persuade visitors not to swallow the Exposition whole,
but to think about it for themselves, and to bear in mind that the men
behind it, those of today and those of days remote, were human beings
exactly like themselves, and to draw from it all they could in the way
of genuine benefit.
Though the volume is mainly devoted to the artistic features associated
with the courts and the main palaces, I have included, among the
illustrations, pictures of the California Building, both because of its
close relation to California and because it is in itself magnificent,
and of two notable art features, the mural painting by Bianca in the
Italian Building, and "The Thinker", by Rodin, in the court of the
French Pavilion.