…at the British Museum, history as a platform

The museum is one of the most iconic expressions of Greek Revival in Britain, and possibly in the world. Greek Revival was an 18th and 19th century spinoff of Neoclassicism, varying from its parent movement only in the nuance of proportions and the absence of Roman elements like the arch. The building, designed by Sir Roger Smirke, was completed in 1847 boasting an incredible scaled-up version of the Ionic order with a facade of 44 columns that still stand to this date.

The museum is one of the most iconic expressions of Greek Revival in Britain, and possibly in the world.

Although it has undergone additions and reconstructions since then – from Smirke’s own brother’s design of the famous Reading Room in the centre courtyard to Norman Foster’s transformation of that same central space – the facade of the building still reminds us of the Athena Polias temple that the original design was based upon.

The Neoclassical movement has a tension between past and future embedded in its very name. It is an attempt to re-contextualise the past by bringing elements of ancient civilisations to the present. In this regard, the most telling feature of the facade of the British Museum is its pediment – the triangular shaped horizontal gable supported by columns. Through the length of this almost-replica of a Greek temple  we can see a sculpture, completed in 1851 by Sir Richard Westmacott.

It depicts the linear development of an uneducated hunter who gets acquainted with different personified arts in his way to fulfill ‘The Progress of Civilisation’, an idea that lends its name to the piece. At this point, it can seem to us somewhat striking that a building that emulates an ancient architectural style speaks so loudly about a linear view of cultural evolution. The explanation is a story that goes hand-in-hand with a contemporaneous narrative: the history of progress as an idea.

The explanation is a story that goes hand-in-hand with a contemporaneous narrative: the history of progress as an idea.

The idea of progress can be traced back to Enlightened rationalist ideas of social and technological improvement, popularised in Europe and America less than a century before the completion of the British Museum. Although the notion had been hinted at before, it was Voltaire, as one of the most influential intellectual leaders of the 18th century Enlightenment, who introduced the idea of progress as a historical phenomenon.

The idea was based on the belief that societies naturally tend to improve, slowly correcting their mistakes as they advance, getting nearer to an ideal state of peace and equality driven by reason. The concept was widespread even after Voltaire’s death, so ingrained in the new progressive way of thinking that it was treated almost as fact.

But while philosophers and politicians were busy with the future, other scholars started, for the first time since the Renaissance, looking at the past. This interest was triggered by a most unseeming event: the construction of a summer palace for the King on Naples in 1738. During the excavation of its foundations, remains of Herculaneum, and later of Pompeii, were unearthed. Until that point, both cities had been buried by ash and oblivion after Vesuvius’s infamous eruption.

The archaeological expedition that followed the discovery not only brought the cities back to light; it started a frenzy for knowledge about the Ancient Greek and Roman civilisations which, until that point, had only been seen through the lense of the Renaissance. The fervent enthusiasm to study the monuments of antiquity from the source soon prompted historians and architects to visit the sites, and the sketches and studies they produced were widespread across Europe.

While philosophers and politicians were busy with the future, other scholars started, for the first time since the Renaissance, looking at the past.

We can attribute this veritable feat of cataloguing to scholars like Johann Joachim Winckelmann, Jean-Nicolas-Louis Durand, Hubert Robert, Giovanni Battista Piranesi… all of them, authors of magnificent drawings that gave a new life to a world that was all but lost.

The German writer Joaquim Goethe articulated the relevance of these authors by comparing Winckelmann to Christopher Columbus; in his opinion, his studies. In particular, his masterpiece Geschichte der Kunst des Alterthums or The History of Art in Antiquity (1764), made him the father of modern of archaeology, opening the eyes of European nations to a whole new world.

We may now begin to understand how a building like the British Museum can represent such opposite notions; after all, the idea of relentless progress and the infatuation with Classical architecture were contemporary trends. Nonetheless, the enthusiastic revival of ancient monuments and the newly-found faith in progress did represent opposing ideas: one elevating the past, the other elevating the future.

And, indeed, their coexistence did not last very long. Doubts about an unequivocally optimistic direction of society soon started to flourish. War, famine, the downsides of the industrial revolution… there was no question that humanity was developing, but there were many hints that this development was not always for the better. The 19th century was teaming with technological advances, but also with inequality, social tragedies and the replacement of  virtue with capitalism.

We may now begin to understand how a building like the British Museum can represent such opposite notions.

Philosophers and sociologists started to heavily criticise their predecessors for what they saw as, in Nietzsche’s words, ‘weakling’s doctrines of optimism’. In typical Romantic fashion, the 19th century embraced the crude reality of suffering which, in cases like the living conditions of the proletariat, could be directly attributed to “progress”. Nietzche and his contemporaries swiftly changed the philosophical approach to past, present, and future from a linear to a cyclic point of view, what they called the ‘eternal recurrence’. But, as it often happens with works of architecture, the British Museum and its symbolic pediment stayed in the same place, with the same message, withstanding wars, governments and ideological changes.

It is impossible to know if the conceptual juxtaposition of past and future was the original intention of the architect and the sculptor who designed the facade of the British Museum. What is clear from our detached point of view, is that the building embeds a lesson about the malleability and fluidity of the way we see our path, our future, our origins, and our heritage. Architecturally, the British Museum is remarkable because it manages to embody both sides of an argument, idealising the past by emulating Ancient Greek architecture while looking forward to the future with its symbolic facade.

It is successful because it is able to take the best of both worlds and, putting them right next to each other, it makes sure that neither of them is allowed to overpower the other. In the end, it is an argument for optimism, using the past for inspiration rather than nostalgia, and using the future to gather enthusiasm rather than anxiety.

History has taught us time and again that progress can be dangerous, and that embellishing the past beyond reality can be misleading; that we have to be conscious of the steps we take and the direction we choose, as well as of forgetting the mistakes we have made in the past. In the Enlightened world devoted to the idea of progress, buildings like the British Museum rebalanced our expectations of ourselves, suggesting that it might just be possible that there are things we did better a couple of thousand years ago than we do now. With their exaltation of the past, Neoclassical facades, unintentionally but necessarily, triggered the idea that progress should not be taken for granted, that if we do not make careful decisions forward could become downward.

Neoclassical facades triggered the idea that progress should not be taken for granted…

On the other hand, as naive as the message about elemental progress in the pediment may seem in a post-holocaust, post-atomic bomb world in the brink of a climate emergency, we can still take away from it the optimism for a better future and, most importantly, the enthusiasm to make it happen. We should be weary of believing in progress as a given, but we should also find the courage to look forward, and to use history as a platform from which to elevate ourselves.

The British Museum managed to turn history into heritage at a time when the past was looked at with contempt and, today, it reminds us of the hope we can have for days to come at a time when making the right decisions as a society seems more important than ever.