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Excerpt from
Buffalo City Hall: American Masterpiece,"
by John H. Conlin
Pub. by the Landmark Society of the Niagara Frontier, 1993, pp. 26-27
The front and rear end walls of the lobby at the
second floor level, display large richly colored mural paintings by William de Leftwich
Dodge, a New York City artist. They appear to be held aloft by two green marble pillars,
as though on an easel.
The painting at the rear, facing the entrance, is titled "Talents Diversified
Find Vent in Myriad Form." Seated in the center is a heroic female figure
of Buffalo, haloed in a sunburst. She is holding forth festoons of golden fruit.
A Native American offers her a bundle of cattails. The mural represents the industries
of Buffalo at which her citizens work. Grain storage, agriculture, water commerce,
steelmaking, construction, and transportation are all represented.
The mural painting opposite is called "Frontiers Unfettered by Any Frowning
Fortress." It illustrates the significance of Buffalo's location at the
border of Canada. The central figure of a woman, Buffalo as Peace, holds a warrior
under each arm while they are clutching their respective flags.
At the left is the United States, represented by consumer goods and machinery.
At the right is Canada, with a fisherman and a voyageur with a canoe. Behind Peace
is Niagara Falls connecting both countries. On the Canadian side is the Peace Bridge,
and on the American, Buffalo City Hall. The background of the murals is gold.
Style
The muscular, postured figure - studies, and the
style of the murals in general - are of the 16th century Italian Mannerists, students
of Michelangelo who repeatedly copied his mural figures. It is a rich, colorful,
ornamental style.
William de Leftwich Dodge
William de Leftwich Dodge studied in the late 19th
century in Europe, notably with the French academic painter, Jean Leon Gerome. Dodge's
murals won many awards in late 19th century international expositions and received
praise in numerous installations in Boston, New York, and Washington, DC. His mural
"Ambition" in the Library of Congress is well known. Other mural work is
in respected New York hotels, among them the Astor, Algonquin, Devon, and Waldorf
Astoria, in the Majestic Theater in Boston, Esquire Theater in New York, Academy
of Music in Brooklyn, and Orpheum Theater in Kansas City.
Four lunettes
Four smaller Dodge murals are located at the ends
of the four secondary corridors serving the first floor. The corridors are two-story-high
vaults forming, at their termination, a semi-circular wall at the second story level.
Because of their shape, the murals mounted on these curved walls are called lunettes.
They represent four major services provided by the city government.
"Charity" (Welfare) is a seated female figure of Buffalo in the
form of an angel of mercy extending a bag of coins to the aged and a loaf of bread
to the infirm.
"Protection" represents the services of the city police and firemen,
insuring safety of citizens.
"Education" is represented by a seated female figure wearing
a poet's garland, instructively gesturing, surrounded by various instruments of education.
"Construction" (Public Works) is a muscular male figure to the
left of whom kneels John Wade, putting the finishing touches on a model of Buffalo
City Hall.
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