# Nashville War Auditorium



## Gabriel (Mar 29, 2022)

The Parthenon is an impressive building and has received much attention on this forum due to its prominence in the expo.  However, to my surprise, the Athena statue was built in 1990.

This statue of Athena certainly is important (below) but not the finest work of the generation.  The War Auditorium that I will show contains a sculpture worthy of comparison.  The sculpture is called the Victory Statue and was sculpted in 1925 as a dedication to those who gave their lives to World War I.  It makes it harder to criticize a war monument, but that certainly won't stop me because it is apparent that this isn't a war monument. 

While the Parthenon from its exterior is very impressive, Athena as a sculpture, is less than impressive and more of a reflection of the art of our era.  The statue seems out of place.  I would venture a guess that the statue was built this way to be of shiny gold to distract and to entertain.  The sculpture has no anatomical features on her neck, her face and nose is very square. 






The focus of my interest is the War Auditorium (solid arrow in photo below), which the photo below shows it's location relative to the Capital Building (center).










source


Anachronistically, this amounts to one more Doric Greek, Pagan-inspired, early-1900s sculpture in a region and era of conservative Christian ministers.  What I find peculiar is the lack of documented debate over whether a Christian society should spend its tax dollars amounting to an incredible amount of money on immortalizing a pagan civilization of the past over their present one.  Or, were these structures built long ago?  Do these statues cover a burial site?  Nonetheless, it is an irregular tribute to WWI soldiers. 




 


Behind the sculpture, this scene is found in several locations.  Is this a "solar boat"? (source for illustration) and the typical 8(edit: 8-1) petal flower that I have personally seen in several buildings in my area supposed to have been built between 1840 and 1920.



In the entrance to the cloister, you can seen the sun pattern, and the swastika patterns as well.  The sun pattern 

also covers every window above Athena seen in the first photo above.






The corners of the war department have depictions of Medusa again, and I am not sure why that is, any thoughts?






In the manner that Athena present's Nike in her right hand, this statue is presenting with his left hand and faces the twin column gateway 800 meters or so away.  The layout of this monument and the unobstructed sight to the gateway gives the perception that this monument is more important than many other landmarks.   That is certainly the impression one gets when they see it.  There are a few elements of sun worship and I am undecided on if the purpose of this monument and art is to advance sun worship or something else.  It's fairly erotic for 1925 sensibilities is it not?  Regardless of when this building and monument were created, I am interested to hear other's impressions of the esoteric nature of this monument.​


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