Twelfth International Conference on The Inclusive Museum

Abstract

The Architectural League of New York started its annual exhibition in the late 1880s. In 1925, the League launched a new series of display by expanding its exhibitions of odd-years into the grand “Architectural and Allied Arts Exposition.” The inaugurating biennial show enjoyed great success in both attendance and media coverage, with its well-organized programs, the widely-expanded exhibits, and the celebratory reviews; but criticisms emerged and gradually intensified with the subsequent shows, culminating in the controversy around the incident that lead to the notorious “Rejected” exhibition in spring 1931. Based on a wide-range of contemporary literature as well as supporting archival material, this study places the Architectural League’s expositions in the context of the architectural display in the professional and popular scenes of 1920’s New York on the theme of architecture, reviews the gloriously crafted format and the overwhelmingly compiled contents of these shows, informs and analyzes the rising criticisms as the discourse unfolded itself and the Architectural League’s counter measures in response to the criticisms, examines the effect of these measures, and assesses the historical significance of the Architectural League of New York’s biennial expositions, arguing that although the Great Depression was the ultimate cause for the fading away of the interest in architecture on the popular front after 1933, the intellectual incompetence of the organization and curatorship of the series may also contribute a significant role to its becoming defunct in the professional scene.