The
interior is largely faced in white marble,
and features a domed ceiling adorned with
120,000 gold stars - one for each of New
South Wales' military volunteers during
World War 1. Access to the main hall is
provided via broad stairways on each side
of the building's north-south axis, while
ground-level doorways on the east and
west sides offer entry to the lower section.
The main focus of the interior is Rayner
Hoff's monumental bronze sculpture of
a deceased youth, representing a soldier,
held aloft on his shield by three female
figures, representing his mother, sister
and wife. The male figure's nudity was
considered shocking at the time of the
monument's opening, and it is said to
be the only such representation of a naked
male form within any war memorial. Two
other even more controversial figural
sculptures designed by Hoff - one featuring
a naked female figure - were never installed
on the eastern and western faces of the
structure as intended, partly as a result
of opposition from high ranking local
Catholic Church representatives.
The
building's exterior is adorned with several
bronze friezes, carved granite relief
panels and twenty monumental stone figural
sculptures symbolising military personnel,
also by Hoff. Immediately to the north
of the ANZAC Memorial is a large rectangular
"Lake of Reflections" flanked
by rows of poplars. The poplars, not native
to Australia, symbolise the areas of France
in which Australian troops fought. Original
plans called for the construction of similar
pools on each of the other sides of the
building, but these were never built.
The term ANZAC in the memorial's name
is an acyronym for "Australian and
New Zealand Army Corps", which was
the original name for the combined corps
of Australian and New Zealand troops who
fought in World War I.
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