Fountains unite the mastery of design with water, one of nature's most essential resources. This exhibition explores the history, design, functions, and meanings of European and American fountains. Created to satisfy basic refreshment needs, fountains developed to reflect mythology, politics, memory, power, and culture. Some of the world's greatest cities--Rome, Paris, New York, Chicago--as well as some of its smallest towns, are distinctive because of fountains.

Water continually shapes our world, and people constantly devise ways to capture and control it. Originally, the word fountain referred to a natural spring, but it has come to mean an artificial structure designed to contain and move water, providing people with refreshment, aesthetic pleasure, or both. In many fountains, architecture and sculpture dominate water's decorative sprays, jets, flows, or cascades. In other fountains, the water action is the primary feature. Fountain designers consider how water should move--with gentle insistence or raging force; how water should sound--as a soothing trickle or as a surging splash; and how water should look--clear and smooth or frothy and white. Many European fountains designed long ago still rank as pinnacles of artistic achievement. Today, designers continue to devise adventurous ways to enliven places with water, offering people tranquil respite, diverting entertainment, or profound experiences of human creativity.

	The exhibition is organized by themes rather than by chronology:
	I.	The Rise and Fall of Water
	II.	Fountains as Refreshment
	III.	Fountains as Propaganda
	IV.	Fountains as Commemoration
	V.	Fountains as Entertainment and Pleasure
	VI.	Fountains as Spectacle at International Expositions
	VII.	Fountains as Urban Oases