exhibition 1964/65 New York World's Fair. The Spanish Pavilion
The exhibition commemorates the 50th anniversary of Spain's participation in the New York World's Fair.
The School of Architecture of the University of Navarra hosts a exhibition commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of Spain's participation in the New York World's Fair in the two seasons of 1964 and 1965. It accompanies the celebration of the IX International congress on the History of Spanish Architecture, which deals with "Architectural exhibitions and the architecture of exhibitions. Spanish architecture and international exhibitions (1925-1975)" and will be open from its opening next Wednesday, May 7 at 19:30h until Saturday, June 7, 2014.
The Spanish Pavilion for the 1964/1965 New York World's Fair is the work of the architect Javier Carvajal, recently deceased. At the time, the critics of the specialized media and the press in general were full of praise for the Spanish pavilion: 'The Jewel of the Fair' according to Life, 'a luminous star' according to The New York Times, or 'The Queen of the Fair' according to Progressive Architecture. The Spanish pavilion was awarded the gold medal of the Fair and the distinction of the American Institute of Architects, in addition to other awards. And it was widely published.
According to data of the Spanish expedition, the pavilion would be visited by more than 3 million people between the two seasons -by far the most visited of the entire fair- making the more than 7 million dollars invested well spent and beyond dispute: the pavilion had done more for Spain's prestige in six months than in several decades.
The exhibition, which is accompanied by a catalog, takes advantage of the original material on the pavilion that is deposited in the Javier Carvajal Ferrer Fund of the file General of the University of Navarra. It is divided into four sections: 'At the Fair!exhibits some original material of the fair and the pavilion, souvenirs, postcards, official guides; 'The Spanish Pavilion' sample reproductions of some of the most representative plans of those deposited in the Javier Carvajal Ferrer Fund of the file General of the University of Navarra; 'The Small Prado Museum' briefly approaches the enormous exhibition contents of the pavilion and 'The Most Outstanding Building of its Kind' outlines the critical fortune of the pavilion in the specialized media and in the press. In addition, there is a reproduction of some photographs, a video compilation of what appeared in the NO-DO of the time, and a model of the pavilion.
The catalog includes a wider selection of the pavilion's plans and other photographs from the Javier Carvajal Fund at file General of the University of Navarra.