Commission of Fine Arts approves Trump Triumphal Arch to move forward

The U.S. Commission of Fine Arts (CFA) on Thursday approved the project to construct President Trump’s proposed 250-foot Triumphal Arch, to be located between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery, forward.

The commission reviewed the Interior Department’s submitted plans to build an arch in Memorial Circle on Columbia Island, a human-made, National Park Service-ran island in the Potomac River between Washington, D.C. and Arlington, Virginia.

“It’s going to be really beautiful. I think it’s going to be fantastic,” Trump told potential donors at an event earlier this year.

“Carefully designed, thoughtfully placed, such a structure will enrich Washington’s historic fabric, adding a new chapter to the infinitely rich history of our nation’s capital,” Bergum said at the start of the meeting.

“Great nations build beautiful structures and works of art that cultivate national pride and love of country,” he added. “In this tradition, the United States Triumphal Arch will be a project of which all Americans will be proud of.”

CFA Vice Chairman James McCrery III offered several critiques to the design, including the addition of gold lions positioned outward from the arch’s base. He argued that given lions are not native to North America, they should be replaced with a species of animal from the continent.

But he praised the overall project, saying that the arch will become a part of Washington and “part of what people come to Washington for.”

“I’m wondering if this arch doesn’t better participate in the language of Washington, D.C.’s monumental architecture, because without it, rather than with it,” he said. “And I do use that word intentionally, ‘participate in,’ because I think that this arch does participate in the monumental form. This arch does contribute to it, it extends it, and it will become part of the federal enclave, it will become part of Washington’s great memorial population, if you will.”

The CFA received just under 1,000 submitted comments about the project, according to the commission’s secretary Thomas Luebke. He added that “100 percent” of the comments were against the project.

Some public comments during the meeting came from Washington residents who expressed their personal connection to the bridge as it has stood for years. Others said they revered its symbolism in bridging the union’s capital with the South following the Civil War.

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