A Message from our President: President’s Letter I’ve just returned from a couple of weeks in Southern Germany and Austria, with a side trip to Prague. Of course, I visited and photographed historic buildings wherever I went. In Vienna, a highlight was the Secession Building where exhibits, true to the Secession’s founding principles, are still selected by a majority vote of its artist-members. I bought a book that mapped out other examples of Jugendstil in its various phases, and I understand the tourist information offices offer a pamphlet along the same lines. What a pleasure to find bars, bookshops, residences, businesses, and public buildings in use, mostly for their original purposes, and well kept. Prague has a potential to become another magnet for travelers with an interest in the early stages of modernism. A museum devoted to Alphonse Mucha, with both on-premise and a satellite gift store, is much publicized. One hotel advertises itself as an Art Nouveau landmark, with little in its interior to support the claim, however. A couple of hotel-restaurants on Wenceslas Square and the wonderful Municipal House nearby receive brief notice among the sea of Baroque, Neo-Baroque, and Medieval landmarks. But the alert pedestrian can find inspired examples of Czech Jugendstil storefronts, apartment houses, theaters, and restaurants in the Nové Město (New Town) section on streets outside the tourist zones. Some have been ill-treated over time, many only need a good cleaning to shine like the jewels they once were. While the Secession Building contains an illustrated account of its history, including a scene of much of the building in ruin attributed to a fire set by departing German soldiers at the end of World War II, plaques on the many ancient churches, abbeys, palaces, and public buildings in Germany that were hard-hit by Allied bombing merely mention that the buildings were damaged during the war, without identifying extent or perpetrators. They go on to give the years when rebuilding was done (mostly in the 1960s). While this downplaying of epic destruction and massive reconstruction diplomatically encourages both American tourism and German cultural identity, it obscures the prodigious accomplishments of design and craftsmanship in the post-war restorations. Who were these individuals who figured out how to put these exquisite cathedrals and palaces back together? How did they solve the structural issues the ancient builders had overcome but not documented? And what stories there must be about training stonecutters, masons, stained glass craftsmen, and the like! This is a story that deserves attention. —Merry Ovnick Click here to view Previous Messages from the President