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Alejandro Chataing’s contribution to the skilled handling of materials is evident in the buildings he designed for the first centennial of Venezuela’s Independence in 1910, particularly the Nation-al Library building, located on the old grounds of the San Francisco Convent. Its neo-gothic façade, which it shares with the Palace of the Academies, was designed by HurtadoManrique. The reading room’s lightweight metallic cover is the building’s protagonist, «and the international references in its description can be seen as a tribute to its author’s unachieved aims». Chataing, who won the project contest, managed to produce even lighting in the room with a translucent roof and window-like gratings, emulating reading rooms like in the National Library in Paris. Considered a beaux-arts building, the room occupies the center and is surrounded by the book depositories. Concrete was used to achieve a rigid frame, to support the metallic structure. The character of this architecture, experimenting again with cement, did not depend directly on the construction system or materials, but on the zenithal light and the collection of books seen between the pillars supporting the large roof, like in the Washington Library of Congress reading room. The «Centennial works» were key to the development of new techniques in Venezuelan architecture.
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