096 THE NATIONAL GALLERY
spoke out. On 30 May 1984, he addressed the 150th Gala Evening of the RIBA and called the design ‘a monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much-loved and elegant friend’, comparing it to a ‘municipal fire station’ and ramming the point home by invoking Goethe: ‘Tere is nothing more dreadful than imagination without taste’. Not since the Prince Consort gave his approval to the Crystal Palace had royalty been so concerned with the design of a public building in England. Paul Koralek tried pointing out that ‘a carbuncle was also a rare jewel’ but to no avail. Te National Gallery competition was scuppered. Carbuncles usually take only a few weeks to heal: not this one. British architecture was changed for decades. For ABK, it was, to quote Browning, ‘never a glad, confident morning again’. I hesitate to use a dreadful cliché, but I shall: the rest is history. Winning was a responsibility that always combined intellectual prestige with a strong whiff of poisoned chalice. Teir challenge had been impossible: to steer and make sense of a cultural juggernaut that carried the potential to burnish or upend reputations. It was easier to blame architecture than politics. A sterile battle of styles broke out, ‘modernist’ against ‘traditionalist’, which obscured the larger factors – mostly to do with money and power – dictating why places are built well or badly. HRH had been advised at different stages by a number of people: Rod Hackney, a pioneer of community architecture; Leon Krier, Poundbury’s chief planner and architect; and, principally, Teo Crosby of Pentagram. Te overlap between postmodernism and preservationist ideas became a cultural amnesia after the Modern Movement, the rise of nostalgia and the manipulation of history as a commodity. Reyner Banham had written about the ‘Revenge of the Picturesque’ as manifestations of an anti-modernist sentiment became ingrained in architecture. However, the British public had shown a more enthusiastic attitude to Prince Charles’ view on architecture. ‘A Vision of Britain’ was broadcast on television, attracting more than two million viewers. Tis was followed up with a publication that culminated in Ten Principles that became a set of design guidelines for Poundbury, but began as the Ten Commandments for the Duchy of Cornwall drafted by Crosby. Despite the positive public response, Prince Charles was accused by the architectural profession of sabotaging the democratic procedures of planning permission, to no avail. Te 19th century obsession with history had led not only to the imitation of past styles but also to the demand for one expressing a contemporary spirit and answering contemporary needs. One response, made mainly in Britain, was eclecticism. Alexander James Beresford Hope opined in 1856 that the only ‘common-sense architecture for the future of England’ was Gothic ‘cultivated in the spirit of progression founded upon
eclecticism.’ Tere is a fundamental difference between the eclecticism of 19th century and postmodern architects. Te 19th century architects resorted to it in a climate of historicism. Faith in a single ideal had faltered. ‘Doubt begat eclecticism,’ as Baudelaire remarked in 1848. But then, what are we to eclect?
Te battle over post-modern buildings: columns again, the second competition In May 1984, the ABK scheme was refused planning permission and the proposal to extend the National Gallery came to a halt until April the following year when the Sainsbury family offered to fund a new wing entirely for the use of the Gallery. A new search for an architect began and a shortlist of six was drawn up, a notably different list to the finalists of the first competition: Harry Cobb, Colquhoun and Miller, Jeremy Dixon, Piers Gough, James Stirling and Robert Venturi. Venturi Scott Brown was revealed as the preferred architect in January 1986, the same month as Prince Charles had been appointed a trustee of the National Gallery by Margaret Tatcher – a key point in the debate between architectural traditionalists and modernists in Britain, having already made his personal views clear with regards the winner of the first competition.
Te first meeting of the trustees attended by the prince was in November 1986, when he was in agreement with Venturi. Te minutes record that ‘the Prince of Wales said how much he liked the window towards Canada House that the architect had proposed’ – a large window that would have faced Trafalgar Square at the end of the long central suite of galleries. Other trustees disagreed believing the view from the window would distract from the art, and that sunlight might cause conservation problems. Ten, in March 1987, the question of the column came up, the prince telling the board that ‘a column as an architectural feature should act as a support’. Bridget Riley, another trustee, presented a paper that also argued that Venturi’s fake column should be removed. All the trustees ultimately agreed.
Postmodern architecture as conceived by Venturi meant elements drawn from diverse sources were to be absorbed, recast, and often transformed before being used. Te column was the final straw that nearly ended Venturi’s direct involvement. People tend to forget that Venturi threatened to resign following criticism of the column by Prince Charles and other trustees, and that the chairman, Jacob Rothschild, warned his fellow trustees that this threat should be kept confidential and ‘must not be known outside the building’. Te minutes record that John Rauch, Venturi’s partner, had ‘passed on a request from the architect that the scheme should be handed over to another firm since their firm wished to withdraw’. Rothschild told the board that one option would be for ‘a firm of British architects’ to take over, with
Venturi ‘acting as a design consultant’. Because of Venturi’s resignation threat, the trustees relented and finally agreed to the inclusion of the column. Later, in 1987, relations between architect and gallery improved and in March 1988 the Prince and Princess of Wales laid the foundation stone. Building work began – without the window, but with the column. Te cost of the extension was more than £33m. Te full cost was paid for by the Sainsbury brothers. Te building was opened by the Queen in July 1991. Te prince’s introduction to the gallery’s own book about the Wing says
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