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German far-right politicians want to declare Bauhaus led modernism in the 'wrong direction'

2024-10-26T08:00:00-04:00

The German far-right AfD party has attacked the original Bauhaus as a pernicious example of design, saying it led the project of modernism in the "wrong direction." Their statement, which echoes the disdain put forth by Hitler and the Nazi party, comes from an official motion in front of the country’s parliament asking for an official reappraisal of its legacy in advance of the 100th anniversary of the Bauhaus Dessau in 2025/26.

They say: "The emphasis on sobriety and minimalism often led to impersonal architecture that is perceived as cold, unwelcoming and unattractive." (h/t ARTnews)

The episode brings to mind the outrage of the architecture community in response to then-President Donald Trump's planned executive order in favor of classical architecture, the tenor of which (e.g., that it restores America's grandeur) is akin to the views advanced by Viktor Orban and many other modern adherents to a more discreet form of fascism.

For the record, the Bauhaus was a school, not a style

2019-05-01T14:09:00-04:00

While architecture was not taught at the school for the first half of its existence, even today we speak of “Bauhaus architecture” and feel confident that we know precisely what that means — even though, often, what we call “Bauhaus” has no connection to the school at all.

100 years after the inauguration of the famed Bauhaus school, we must still be reminded of some of its most essential principles. Namely, Barry Bergdoll admonishes, the Bauhaus was never a 'style' - it was a school of thought that advocated for the abolition of distinctions between the various fields of art, as well as that between "the fine and the useful."

Benita Koch-Otte, Woven Wall Hanging, 1923-24. Manufactured by Bauhaus

As Bergdoll argues, the term 'Bauhaus' "has become a catchall synonym for modernism in architecture and design. The details of the school’s history — the huge diversity of forms, ideologies, opinion and experiments, not to mention the influence of its three directors — are more the concerns of academic historians than of those who continue to burnish the legend and exploit the selling power of the name 'Bauhaus.' No less does it remain a term of derision for neo-traditionalists, who see the modernist Bauhaus as the great destroyer of values enshrined in classi...

Revisiting the “surreal, weirder” spirit of the Bauhaus

2019-03-15T14:32:00-04:00

Many imitators have missed the element of Bauhaus that breathed life into what might have become sterile functionalist designs; the surreal, sensual, irrational, and instinctual spirit of the Bauhaus. [...] If one seeks to emulate the Bauhaus today, it is vital to remember the elements of weirdness, pleasure, and even organized chaos that made it what it was. And, also, the moments where it failed to rise to fulfill its own ambitions and principles.

Many people today recognize the Bauhaus — which is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year — for its clean lines and minimalist aesthetic. In this piece, writer Darran Anderson delves into the history of the “other, weirder, irrational” side of the infamous art school.

Turns out, Walter Gropius was more warm and fuzzy than we remember him to be

2019-03-06T19:18:00-05:00

Though he was described by architectural historians as "humorless," Walter Gropius "was in fact a charismatic figure," according to The Guardian's Fiona MacCarthy. His life and career are shrouded in myths of solemnity and passionlessness, though the fact remains that he imparted a significant and long-lasting passion towards founding the Bauhaus as well as his own career as an architect.

Drawings of the Bauhaus School in Dessau, by Walter Gropius

Gropius was poetic in his writing (as MacCarthy highlights a passage from his Bauhaus Manifesto: “Together let us desire, conceive, and create the new structure of the future, which will one day rise toward heaven from the hands of a million workers like the crystal symbol of a new faith”), expressionist in his early work, and an advocate of healthy debate in his fabled school of art and design. And while Tom Wolfe famously criticized the architect as a champion of the modern high rise, MacCarthy points out that Gropius was not only one ...

Celebrated and Detested: 100 Years of Bauhaus

2019-01-21T16:20:00-05:00

“Every child,” lamented Tom Wolfe in From Bauhaus to Our House of 1981, “goes to school in a building that looks like a duplicating-machine replacement-parts wholesale distribution warehouse”. Had there ever been another place on earth, he also said of Bauhaus-influenced America, “where so many people of wealth and power paid for and put up with so much architecture they detested?”

Observer architecture critic, Rowan Moore, on the vast and enduring impact of the "short-lived but longlasting" Bauhaus movement—both the sympathetic and the averse.

The famed school celebrates the centenary of its original founding this year.

The Bauhaus Revisited

2018-09-12T17:52:00-04:00

Another measure for a work of art might be the range and violence of criticisms it attracts, along with their contradictions.

Maybe I’m just being sentimental, but I keep finding myself returning to the Bauhaus, now approaching its centenary. Much has been written here about the narrowness of current architecture and its instruction. I’m an outsider, yet I can’t help wondering if the field has followed the path of other arts into specialization and self-reference and self-interest, which is too often the case in my field, writing and the teaching of writing. What strikes me about the Bauhaus is the mix of influences. As I note:

“While Gropius wanted to revive the communal spirit of the guilds that built cathedrals in the Middle Ages, one is at a loss to find Christian tenets or iconography in the Bauhaus instruction or its work. The influences instead were esthetic and diverse, from Romanticism to Expressionism to Functionalism, as were the interests of the instructors, some of the most creative artists and architects of the time—Gropius himself, Mies van der Rohe, Klee, Kandinsky, Feininger, Schlemmer, Mo...

Gropius, Breuer and Moholy-Nagy honored with English Heritage blue plaque at the Isokon Building

2018-07-09T16:04:00-04:00

A trio of Bauhaus visionaries were commemorated this morning with an English Heritage blue plaque, unveiled at the famed Isokon building where the honorees Walter Gropius, Marcel Breur and László Moholy-Nagy once lived and worked.

Celebrating the links between notable figures of the past with buildings of the present, the commemorative signs provide intriguing glimpses into the the built environment's past. From pioneering black figures who helped shape the city of London to Britain's prized literary figures, the plaques call attention to where these famous persons lived and worked, and where history was made.

The Isokon Building, which is itself, one of the finest achievements of modern design, presented a unique opportunity to honor part of that movement's legacy.

“To be able to recognize three prominent individuals of the Bauhaus – Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer and László Moholy-Nagy – together on the same building where they lived and worked is an excellent opportunity to hon...

Modern dreams: spend a night at the Bauhaus

2018-07-05T15:44:00-04:00

A very special kind of Bauhaus experience awaits visitors here: overnight accommodation in the studio building. In the recreated studios, the atmosphere of the Bauhaus remains palpable today. Everything from the floor plan and the materials to replicas of the original furniture has been returned to its original state in meticulous detail.

As the Bauhaus approaches its centennial next year, what better way to emerge oneself in the essence of Modernism than enjoying an overnight stay in the school founder's most iconic creation, the Walter Gropius-designed Bauhaus building complex in Dessau, Germany.

The Bauhaus Dessau studio building is also know as "Prellerhaus". Photo: Yvonne Tenschert.

The studio building and its gorgeous balconies. Photo: Yvonne Tenschert.

The towering studio building, slightly set back from the school's main building and completed in 1926, is a stunning masterpiece of early modernist architecture, and its 28 rooms that once accommodated the likes of Marcel Breuer, Hannes Meyer, and Josef Albers, are available for reservations via the Bauhaus Dessau booking form.

Redesigned studio room at the Bauhaus Dessau. Photo: Yvonne Tenschert.

Personalized room "Alfred Arndt". Photo: Yvonne Tenschert.

Personalized room "Josef Albers". Photo: ...

Are mental disorders behind modernism? Le Corbusier and Gropius get diagnosed

2018-02-08T13:53:00-05:00

Two researchers recently suggested that autism and post-traumatic stress disorder led to the minimalist stylings of Le Corbusier and Walter Gropius. Their questions and tools are useful, but there’s danger in mistaking one piece of a puzzle for its entirety. The places we inhabit influence the way we see the world [...] Equally and inevitably, psychology has shaped architecture.

Darran Anderson responds to the piece “The Mental Disorders that Gave Us Modern Architecture” by Ann Sussman and Katie Chen, arguing against their totalizing narrative of two influential figures and modernism as a whole.

Sussman and Chen suggest modernist architecture originated from autism in regard to Le Corbusier, and post-traumatic stress disorder in regard to Walter Gropius. The final argument is one against modernism, claiming its origin derives from mental dysfunction.

While it is interesting to consider a possible excuse for Le Corbusier's callousness or the effects of serving in WWI on Gropius, Anderson argues, "the evidence that modern architecture is founded on 'disorders' is highly questionable".

His response reveals an empathetic side to Le Corbusier, and delves into Gropius' immense achievements unimpeded by trauma. Read the full article and go deeper into Anderson's argument for modernism and two of its key figures.

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"The Dessau Bauhaus" documentary now available on YouTube

2016-02-25T17:13:00-05:00

"Does the Bauhaus really offer total liberty, or is it a place of oppression where all intimacy in banished, and the group triumphs over the individual?" asks the narrator midway through the English version of the acclaimed documentary The Dessau Bauhaus. The 28-minute film about Walter Gropius' innovative designs, which was directed by Frédéric Compain, can now be streamed (mostly commercially free) on YouTube:

Getty awards over $1.75 million to fix crappy concrete in "Important Modern Buildings"

2015-06-24T13:58:00-04:00

"Modern architecture is a defining artistic form of the 20th century at considerable risk, often due to the cutting-edge building materials that characterized the movement." -Deborah Marrow

In news that will surely make Prince Charles sigh with displeasure, the Getty Foundation announced it is awarding $1.75 million of grants to help preserve 14 structures in the modern style, including Frank Lloyd Wright’s Unity Temple, Walter Gropius’ residence ‘The Gropius House,’ and the Rietveld Schröder House. This is the second year the foundation has awarded the grants, and has chosen the buildings because (ironically) concrete as a building material has proven to be less than solid. “The use of concrete, while visually striking and radical for its time, has created a unique set of challenges for conserving some of the world’s most important modernist structures,” noted Antoine Wilmering, a senior program officer at the Getty Foundation. “Our new grants offer an excellent opportunity to advance research and conservation practices for this material. The accumulated knowledge that will result from the projects will be of tremendous benefit to the field.”

While the first year's gra...

BIG + KILO launch "BIG Cities" tableware for Rosenthal's Gropius-inspired collection

2014-05-22T14:38:00-04:00

It's all in the details with BIG + KILO's newly launched "BIG Cities" tableware collection. The longtime Danish collaborators worked with major porcelain manufacturer Rosenthal to craft the table set for the company's TAC collection. The collection was first developed in the 1960s and includes designs based on those of Walter Gropius and his historic Boston firm The Architects' Collaborative — or TAC.

The pieces bring present-day appeal to any table setting with minimal, geometric forms that draws its style roots from Bauhaus. At first glance, the thin blue lines etched onto the white porcelain look like an abstract motif.

But taking a closer look reveals the silhouettes of famous architectural landmarks like the Brandenburg Gate, the Eiffel Tower, or Big Ben as well as some recognizable city skylines like Sydney, Moscow, Tokyo, Istanbul, New York, and of course Copenhagen.

Dinner and charger plates are available six different variants each, while all other pieces in the collection com...

A renaissance for Bauhaus as Germany grapples with its past

2014-05-16T13:56:00-04:00

The most striking Bauhaus designs, such as Marcel Breuer's tubular steel chair or the Wagenfeld table lamp, have been endlessly copied and mass produced. But the architecture of the design school has left a more complicated legacy in Germany. [...] reopens two of the art school's most significant houses on Friday, almost 70 years after they were bombed, the move is sure to reignite the old debate about what to do with historic buildings damaged during the second world war.

Ann Beha Architects selected for major rehabilitation of Gropius-designed Athens Chancery

2013-11-19T19:54:00-05:00

Ann Beha Architects from Boston, MA was selected by the U.S. Department of State's Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations (OBO) for a major rehabilitation project of the U.S. Embassy in Athens, Greece. Walter Gropius and consulting architect Pericles A. Sakellarios designed the iconic embassy from 1959-1961. The building is also listed as a protected architectural landmark.

Ann Beha Architects was given the task out of four shortlisted teams that included: DesignLab Architects, Inc. (Boston, MA); Machado Silvetti / Baker (Boston, MA); and Mark Cavagnero Associates (San Francisco, CA).

Previously: Four Design Teams Shortlisted for Major Rehabilitation of Gropius-Designed Athens Chancery

Four Design Teams Shortlisted for Major Rehabilitation of Gropius-Designed Athens Chancery

2013-05-15T19:26:00-04:00

Four design firms have been shortlisted by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations (OBO) for the major rehabilitation of the Athens Chancery project. The iconic modernist embassy building, designed by Walter Gropius with consulting architect Pericles A. Sakellarios, was constructed between 1959 and 1961 and is a protected architectural landmark.

The shortlisted firms are:

Ann Beha Architects, Boston, MA
DesignLab Architects, Inc., Boston, MA
Machado Silvetti / Baker, Boston, MA
Mark Cavagnero Associates, San Francisco, CA

UPDATE: Ann Beha Architects selected for major rehabilitation of Gropius-designed Athens Chancery

Anne Griswold Tyng, Pioneering Architect

2012-05-02T16:07:00-04:00

When Anne Griswold Tyng entered Radcliffe College in 1938, she had already found her calling: her faith was in architecture. “I was intensely drawn to the combination of science and art, of the pragmatic and aesthetic, of rigorous facts and intuitive leaps,” she wrote, looking back nearly 60 years later... In 1942, she enrolled in the first class to admit women at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, where she studied with Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer...

Unesco status for Walter Gropius' Fagus Factory

2011-06-27T20:45:04-04:00

With its strips of glass windows and clean geometric structures, the building paved the way for a modernist style which became the trademark of the Bauhaus. The factory still produces shoe lasts, the forms used to mould shoes, to this day.

Walter Gropius' Fagus Factory has long been considered a frontrunner of modernist architecture. Now, a century after it was designed, the building in the German state of Lower Saxony has been added to the prestigious list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites.