Thus, the Bauhaus style, also known as the International Style, was marked by the absence of ornamentation and by harmony between the function of an object or a building and its design. However, the most important influence on Bauhaus was modernism, a cultural movement whose origins lay as early as the 1880s, and which had already made its presence felt in Germany before the World War, despite the prevailing conservatism.
Its roots lay in the arts and crafts school founded by the Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach in 1906, and directed by Belgian Art Nouveau architect Henry van de Velde.
The German national designers' organization Deutscher Werkbund was formed in 1907 by Hermann Muthesius to harness the new potentials of mass production, with a mind towards preserving Germany's economic competitiveness with England.
Beginning in June 1907, Peter Behrens' pioneering industrial design work for the German electrical company AEG successfully integrated art and mass production on a large scale.
Many fundamental questions of craftsmanship versus mass production, the relationship of usefulness and beauty, the practical purpose of formal beauty in a commonplace object, and whether or not a single proper form could exist, were argued out among its 1,870 members (by 1914). German architectural modernism was known as Neues Bauen.
Gropius's design for the Dessau facilities was a return to the futuristic Gropius of 1914 that had more in common with the International style lines of the Fagus Factory than the stripped down Neo-classical of the Werkbund pavilion or the Völkisch Sommerfeld House.
When van de Velde was forced to resign in 1915 because he was Belgian, he suggested Gropius, Hermann Obrist, and August Endell as possible successors.
The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the Bauhaus (German: "building house"), was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined crafts and the fine arts.
In addition, El Lissitzky's book Russia: an Architecture for World Revolution published in German in 1930 featured several illustrations of Vkhutemas/Vkhutein projects there. == History of the Bauhaus == === Weimar === The school was founded by Walter Gropius in Weimar on 1 April 1919, as a merger of the Grand-Ducal Saxon Academy of Fine Art and the Grand Ducal Saxon School of Arts and Crafts for a newly affiliated architecture department.
In 1919, after delays caused by World War I and a lengthy debate over who should head the institution and the socio-economic meanings of a reconciliation of the fine arts and the applied arts (an issue which remained a defining one throughout the school's existence), Gropius was made the director of a new institution integrating the two called the Bauhaus.
In the pamphlet for an April 1919 exhibition entitled Exhibition of Unknown Architects, Gropius proclaimed his goal as being "to create a new guild of craftsmen, without the class distinctions which raise an arrogant barrier between craftsman and artist." Gropius's neologism Bauhaus references both building and the Bauhütte, a premodern guild of stonemasons.
Swiss painter Johannes Itten, German-American painter Lyonel Feininger, and German sculptor Gerhard Marcks, along with Gropius, comprised the faculty of the Bauhaus in 1919.
A tumultuous year at the Bauhaus, 1922 also saw the move of Dutch painter Theo van Doesburg to Weimar to promote De Stijl ("The Style"), and a visit to the Bauhaus by Russian Constructivist artist and architect El Lissitzky. From 1919 to 1922 the school was shaped by the pedagogical and aesthetic ideas of Johannes Itten, who taught the Vorkurs or "preliminary course" that was the introduction to the ideas of the Bauhaus.
Beyond the Bauhaus, many other significant German-speaking architects in the 1920s responded to the same aesthetic issues and material possibilities as the school.
The acceptance of modernist design into everyday life was the subject of publicity campaigns, well-attended public exhibitions like the Weissenhof Estate, films, and sometimes fierce public debate. === Bauhaus and Vkhutemas === The Vkhutemas, the Russian state art and technical school founded in 1920 in Moscow, has been compared to Bauhaus.
The housing Taut built in south-west Berlin during the 1920s, close to the U-Bahn stop Onkel Toms Hütte, is still occupied. == Impact == The Bauhaus had a major impact on art and architecture trends in Western Europe, Canada, the United States and Israel in the decades following its demise, as many of the artists involved fled, or were exiled by the Nazi regime.
The Harvard School was enormously influential in America in the late 1920s and early 1930s, producing such students as Philip Johnson, I.
After German reunification, a reorganized school continued in the same building, with no essential continuity with the Bauhaus under Gropius in the early 1920s.
By the following year their ranks had grown to include German painter, sculptor, and designer Oskar Schlemmer who headed the theatre workshop, and Swiss painter Paul Klee, joined in 1922 by Russian painter Wassily Kandinsky.
A tumultuous year at the Bauhaus, 1922 also saw the move of Dutch painter Theo van Doesburg to Weimar to promote De Stijl ("The Style"), and a visit to the Bauhaus by Russian Constructivist artist and architect El Lissitzky. From 1919 to 1922 the school was shaped by the pedagogical and aesthetic ideas of Johannes Itten, who taught the Vorkurs or "preliminary course" that was the introduction to the ideas of the Bauhaus.
This influence culminated with the addition of Der Blaue Reiter founding member Wassily Kandinsky to the faculty and ended when Itten resigned in late 1923.
The school in Weimar experienced political pressure from conservative circles in Thuringian politics, increasingly so after 1923 as political tension rose.
This condition was met in 1923 with the Bauhaus' exhibition of the experimental Haus am Horn.
Apart from contributions to the 1923 Haus am Horn, student architectural work amounted to un-built projects, interior finishes, and craft work like cabinets, chairs and pottery. In the next two years under Meyer, the architectural focus shifted away from aesthetics and towards functionality.
Bortnyik was a great admirer of László Moholy-Nagy and had met Walter Gropius in Weimar between 1923 and 1925.
The Bauhaus issued a press release on 26 December 1924, setting the closure of the school for the end of March 1925.
The Bauhaus issued a press release on 26 December 1924, setting the closure of the school for the end of March 1925.
This school was eventually known as the Technical University of Architecture and Civil Engineering, and in 1996 changed its name to Bauhaus-University Weimar. === Dessau === The Bauhaus moved to Dessau in 1925 and new facilities there were inaugurated in late 1926.
Bortnyik was a great admirer of László Moholy-Nagy and had met Walter Gropius in Weimar between 1923 and 1925.
This school was eventually known as the Technical University of Architecture and Civil Engineering, and in 1996 changed its name to Bauhaus-University Weimar. === Dessau === The Bauhaus moved to Dessau in 1925 and new facilities there were inaugurated in late 1926.
The definitive 1926 Bauhaus building in Dessau is also attributed to Gropius.
When Hitler's chief engineer, Fritz Todt, began opening the new autobahn (highways) in 1935, many of the bridges and service stations were "bold examples of modernism"—among those submitting designs was Mies van der Rohe. == Architectural output == The paradox of the early Bauhaus was that, although its manifesto proclaimed that the aim of all creative activity was building, the school did not offer classes in architecture until 1927.
Tel Aviv in 2004 was named to the list of world heritage sites by the UN due to its abundance of Bauhaus architecture; it had some 4,000 Bauhaus buildings erected from 1933 onwards. In 1928, the Hungarian painter Alexander Bortnyik founded a school of design in Budapest called Miihely (also "Muhely" or "Mugely"), which means "the studio".
The school turned its first profit under his leadership in 1929. But Meyer also generated a great deal of conflict.
For example, the pottery shop was discontinued when the school moved from Weimar to Dessau, even though it had been an important revenue source; when Mies van der Rohe took over the school in 1930, he transformed it into a private school and would not allow any supporters of Hannes Meyer to attend it. == Design style == The Bauhaus style tends to feature simple geometric shapes like rectangles and spheres, without elaborate decorations.
In addition, El Lissitzky's book Russia: an Architecture for World Revolution published in German in 1930 featured several illustrations of Vkhutemas/Vkhutein projects there. == History of the Bauhaus == === Weimar === The school was founded by Walter Gropius in Weimar on 1 April 1919, as a merger of the Grand-Ducal Saxon Academy of Fine Art and the Grand Ducal Saxon School of Arts and Crafts for a newly affiliated architecture department.
Dessau mayor Fritz Hesse fired him in the summer of 1930.
Mies was appointed in 1930 and immediately interviewed each student, dismissing those that he deemed uncommitted.
Increasingly through the early 1930s, they characterized the Bauhaus as a front for communists and social liberals.
Indeed, a number of communist students loyal to Meyer moved to the Soviet Union when he was fired in 1930. Even before the Nazis came to power, political pressure on Bauhaus had increased.
Neither Mies van der Rohe nor his Bauhaus students saw any projects built during the 1930s. The popular conception of the Bauhaus as the source of extensive Weimar-era working housing is not accurate.
Victor Vasarely, a pioneer of Op Art, studied at this school before establishing in Paris in 1930. Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer, and Moholy-Nagy re-assembled in Britain during the mid 1930s to live and work in the Isokon project before the war caught up with them.
The Harvard School was enormously influential in America in the late 1920s and early 1930s, producing such students as Philip Johnson, I.
Pei, Lawrence Halprin and Paul Rudolph, among many others. In the late 1930s, Mies van der Rohe re-settled in Chicago, enjoyed the sponsorship of the influential Philip Johnson, and became one of the pre-eminent architects in the world.
Preservation, documentation, and exhibitions have brought attention to Tel Aviv's collection of 1930s architecture.
By 1931, the National Socialist German Workers' Party (Nazi Party) was becoming more influential in German politics.
When it gained control of the Dessau city council, it moved to close the school. === Berlin === In late 1932, Mies rented a derelict factory in Berlin (Birkbusch Street 49) to use as the new Bauhaus with his own money.
The Staatliches Bauhaus (), commonly known as the Bauhaus (German: "building house"), was a German art school operational from 1919 to 1933 that combined crafts and the fine arts.
In 1933, the Gestapo closed down the Berlin school.
However, shortly after receiving a letter permitting the opening of the Bauhaus, Mies and the other faculty agreed to voluntarily shut down the school . Although neither the Nazi Party nor Adolf Hitler had a cohesive architectural policy before they came to power in 1933, Nazi writers like Wilhelm Frick and Alfred Rosenberg had already labelled the Bauhaus "un-German" and criticized its modernist styles, deliberately generating public controversy over issues like flat roofs.
Despite Gropius's protestations that as a war veteran and a patriot his work had no subversive political intent, the Berlin Bauhaus was pressured to close in April 1933.
Tel Aviv in 2004 was named to the list of world heritage sites by the UN due to its abundance of Bauhaus architecture; it had some 4,000 Bauhaus buildings erected from 1933 onwards. In 1928, the Hungarian painter Alexander Bortnyik founded a school of design in Budapest called Miihely (also "Muhely" or "Mugely"), which means "the studio".
When Hitler's chief engineer, Fritz Todt, began opening the new autobahn (highways) in 1935, many of the bridges and service stations were "bold examples of modernism"—among those submitting designs was Mies van der Rohe. == Architectural output == The paradox of the early Bauhaus was that, although its manifesto proclaimed that the aim of all creative activity was building, the school did not offer classes in architecture until 1927.
In 1953, Max Bill, together with Inge Aicher-Scholl and Otl Aicher, founded the Ulm School of Design (German: Hochschule für Gestaltung – HfG Ulm) in Ulm, Germany, a design school in the tradition of the Bauhaus.
The founder of the school, Phyllis Shillito, which opened in 1962 and closed in 1980, firmly believed that "A student who has mastered the basic principles of design, can design anything from a dress to a kitchen stove". One of the most important contributions of the Bauhaus is in the field of modern furniture design.
The school closed in 1968, but the "Ulm Model" concept continues to influence international design education.
In 1979 Bauhaus-Dessau College started to organize postgraduate programs with participants from all over the world.
The founder of the school, Phyllis Shillito, which opened in 1962 and closed in 1980, firmly believed that "A student who has mastered the basic principles of design, can design anything from a dress to a kitchen stove". One of the most important contributions of the Bauhaus is in the field of modern furniture design.
This school was eventually known as the Technical University of Architecture and Civil Engineering, and in 1996 changed its name to Bauhaus-University Weimar. === Dessau === The Bauhaus moved to Dessau in 1925 and new facilities there were inaugurated in late 1926.
In 2003, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) proclaimed Tel Aviv's White City a World Cultural Heritage site, as "an outstanding example of new town planning and architecture in the early 20th century." The citation recognized the unique adaptation of modern international architectural trends to the cultural, climatic, and local traditions of the city.
Tel Aviv in 2004 was named to the list of world heritage sites by the UN due to its abundance of Bauhaus architecture; it had some 4,000 Bauhaus buildings erected from 1933 onwards. In 1928, the Hungarian painter Alexander Bortnyik founded a school of design in Budapest called Miihely (also "Muhely" or "Mugely"), which means "the studio".
Bauhaus Center Tel Aviv organizes regular architectural tours of the city. ===Centenary year, 2019=== As the centenary of the founding of Bauhaus, several events, festivals, and exhibitions are planned around the world in 2019.
All text is taken from Wikipedia. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License .
Page generated on 2021-08-05