It is already evident that inventions no longer are, as they had been in
earlier times, means for warding off want and for helping consumption;
instead, want and consumption are the means to market the inventions.
The order of things has been reversed. …The abundance of means is the
first serious danger with which art has to struggle. Where will the
depreciation of material that results from its treatment by machines, from
substitutes lead? –Gottfried Semper, 1852
How should designers deal with industrialization?
6 years after German unification, the
nation had the chance to show their
industrial ability at the Philadelphia
Centennial
Exhibition
of
1876.
However, visitors commented that
the German goods were “cheap and
nasty.”
The German government
was embarrassed and angry.
How did Germany become the world leader in superior industrial design?
1890:
resignation of Bismark
rise of the demand for improved design in craft and industry
Why did Germans see good design as their path to becoming an economic
powerhouse?
-raw material poor
-no ready outlet for cheap goods (market already filled)
Why did they embrace machine production?
-only economically feasible way to manufacture and mass-market goods
(unlike William Morris, Germans were not interested in one-off craft
produced pieces for a small, well-educated, upper-class. To build their GDP,
they need to mass produce goods. The idea was to appeal to the middle
class’s desire to ‘buy up.’ Naumann reinforced this idea in his 1904 essay,
“Art in the Epoch of the Machine.”)
1907: Muthesius, Naumann, and Schmidt
founded the Deutsche Werkbund
The English Arts and Crafts Movement had seen a
contradiction between art and industrial methods of
art-production. The Werkbund aimed in the first place
to bridge this contradiction without denying the reality
of industrial production. The Germans spoke "of the
artist on the one, of the worker on the other side" they accepted the reality of the division of labor
(Pevsner 24).
1907: Behren (a Werkbund member) is
appointed as AEG’s chief architect and
designer
Peter Behrens. Fan Model No. GB 1.
1908. Painted cast iron and brass,
mfg by A.E.G., Germany.
Behrens.
Nitralampe. 1910.
Mfg by A.E.G.
Behrens’s accepted of
industrialization as
Germany’s destiny. He
built “a temple to
industrial power” while
bringing to the workers a
sense of common
purpose that was lost
when they moved from
the farm to the city
(Frampton 111-12).
Behrens. AEG Turbine Factory. Berlin, 1908-09.
“What is Monumental Art?” –Behrens, 1908
Behrens argued that such art is an expression of the dominant power group
in any given epoch. He also rejected Semper’s theory that form comes
from technical criteria in favor of Riegl’s theory that talented individuals are
ordained to design through their ‘will to form’ (note the Nietzschian influence).
He fell on the Form (individuality) side of the Werkbund style argument (as
opposed to the advocates of Norm, or type.)
Schinkel. Altes Museum. Berlin, 1824-30.
Behrens. German Embassy. St.
Petersburg. 1912.
Gropius and Meyer. Werkbund Pavilion.
View from front showing
glass stairs. Cologne,
1914.
Norm
Van de Velde. Werkbund Exhibition
Theater. Cologne, 1914.
Form
Hermann Muthesius’s address at the Werkbund Exhibition advocated
Norm. He argued that architecture and industrial design can attain
significance only through the development of types that can be massproduced and sold to the world.
Van de Velde countered by rejecting that the goal of design is export
products and proclaiming the creative sovereignty of an individual artist.
He advocated Form, not Norm.
1. Feiniger. Zukunftskathedrale Woodcut for the Bauhaus Proclamation. 1919. 2. Van de
Velde. Grand Ducal School of Arts and Crafts (Bauhaus). Weimar, Germany. 1904-1911.
The Bauhaus resulted from the merger of the former Grand-Ducal Saxon
Academy of Art (Mackensen) with the former Grand-Ducal Saxon School of Arts
and Crafts (directed by Van de Velde, Behrens a teacher), and also was
influenced by the Norm ideology of the Deutche Werkbund.
The ultimate, if distant, aim of the
Bauhaus is the unified work of art – the
great structure – in which there is no
distinction between monumental and
decorative art. –Gropius
The Bauhaus was founded with the
visions of erecting the cathedral of
socialism and the workshops were
established in the manner of the
cathedral building lodges.
The artist was no longer “above” the
craftsman, but both were equals.
1. Fritz Mackensen. Der Säugling (Moor Madonna). 1892. 2. Itten. Horizontal-Vertical.
1915. 3. Klee. Twittering Machine. 1922.
Fritz Machensen thought that designers should be educated in a fine art
academy. Gropius believed that designers and craftsmen should be
educated together in a workshop-based program. Gropius prevailed, but
Itten had the most influence during the first 3 years of the school. He
aimed to release individual creativity and enable each student to access his
own ability. (A 1900s reformer like Dewey)
Wassily Kandinsky. Improvisation 31
(Sea Battle), 1913.
Theo van Doesburg. Counter-Composition XIII.
1925–26.
Can the artistic mind grow in an institutional setting? Can creativity be
taught?
The emotive, mystical approach vs. the rational, anti-individualist aesthetic –
the battles escalates in 1921 when these two artist join the faculty.
Frank Lloyd Wright. Ward Willitts House. Highland Park,
IL, 1902. As published by Wasmuth in 1910.
Van Doesburg’s influence at the Bauhaus was
immediately felt. He helped Gropius resolve his
dilemma of desiring both continuity and spatial
movement and a closed, hard, machined
aesthetic. He did this through the influence of
Wright (published in German by Wasmuth in
1910-11). Van Doesburg’s painting is derived in
part from the linear pattern of the Willitts House.
Theo Van Doesburg. Rhythm of a Russian Dance. 1918.
Frank Lloyd Wright. Ward Willitts House. Highland Park, IL, 1902.
Vantonerloo’s construction
can be derived by
concentrating on the
advancing and receding
volumes. A Neo-Plastic
house if arrived at by reading
the planes as forming hollow
interlocked boxes.
Rietveld and Van
Doesburg. Project for a
Private House. 1920.
George
Vantongerloo.
Construction of
Volume Relations.
1921.
Frank Lloyd Wright.
Ward Willits House.
Highland Park, IL,
1902.
Rietveld’s Schroder
House is arrived at by
separating some of
the planes even
further.
In all of these cases, a
linear and planar
clarity of separate
parts has been
combined with
continuously shifting
sets of spatial
relationships. The
result is a machined
freedom.
Gerrit Rietveld. Schroder
House. Utrecht, 1924-25.
Gerrit Rietveld. Schroder
House. Utrecht, 1924-25.
Café de Unie takes all of the prior
experiments and smoothes them
out into a single plane –
combining strict linear and
rectangular order with the flux
and movement of calculated
asymmetries.
J.J.P. Oud. Café de Unie. Rotterdam. 1924.
Gropius.
Bauhaus.
Dessau.
1925-26.
Finally, by joining all the
planes firmly into boxes
and interlocking their
separate volumes into an
asymmetrical composition
like the continuous
mechanical movement of a
set of gears, Gropius’s
Bauhaus emerges.
Metal Workshop at the
Bauhaus (Dessau)
The form of the
Bauhaus also
reflects Van
Doesburg’s
influence on the
pedagogy.
In 1922, Gropius changed the focus
of the school from craft to the
understanding of industrial methods
of production.
Metal workshop
1923 in Weimar
The classrooms/
administration offices
were built on one
side of the road,
while the studios
were across the
street.
These two volumes
were connected by
the bridge where the
professors had their
offices.
The teachers had
mastered both the
intellectual and
technical knowledge
needed to produce
artistically designed,
economical goods.
MoholyNagy. LightSpace
Modulator.
1921-30.
Albers. Skyscrapers on Transparent Yellow. 1927
Sand blasted flashed glass
Itten left in 1923. His position was filled by Moholy-Nagy, who taught first
year studio with Albers. They reworked the studio so that it concentrated on
revealing the statical and aesthetic properties of free-standing asymmetrical
structures, which portray both a machined purity and a modern continuity of
space.
Albers’s student’s work. 1927-28.
The first year studies
taught basic formal
principles of design to all
majors in the school.
After first year, students
chose a specific
workshop.
Each workshop was
headed by both an artist
and a master craftsman.
Herbert Bayer and Joost Schmidt. Poster for
the Bauhaus Exhibition of 1923.
Van Eestern and Van Doesburg. Model of
their “artist’s house” for the Rosenburg
Exhibition. 1923.
Two examples of the changing Bauhaus design approach, which
acknowledges the change in the means of production and no longer searches
to create a “total work of art” that emotively displays the singular creative
force of its designer. This is work that is done collaboratively.
Homogeneous professional
roles started to dissolve in
practice, or at least to change
radically.
At the same time it seemed
necessary for the student to
take personal responsibility
for his or her studies and the
development of professional
skills.
The Bauhaus workshops (
metal, weaving, pottery,
furniture, typology, wall
painting, and architecture
[after 1927]) were the
birthplaces of new industrial
designs.
The Bauhaus was a socially orientated
program. "An artist must be conscious of his
social responsibility to the community. On the
other hand the community has to accept the
artist and support him."
Specialization together with solid basic
knowledge was not a risk when the students
were employed by the production. They were
able to follow the changes in technology and
society in a flexible manner.
Lazló Moholy-Nagy: Folio
Cover, 1923.
RT: Lucia Moholy, Bauhaus
building Dessau, Balcony of
the studio house, 1926.
Herbert
Bayer,
1932.
Much & Meyer.
Experimental
House. Bauhaus
Exposition. 1923.
Marcel Breuer. Metal Tube Chairs. 1925-29.
The focus on craft continually gave way to the focus on deriving form from
productive method, material constraint, and programmatic necessity.
Breuer’s tubular steel chairs exemplified this approach to creative design
solutions.
“To an ever greater degree the work of art reproduced becomes the work of
art designed for reproducibility.” (Benjamin 224)
Bauhaus
Pendant
Lamp Marianne
Brandt and
Hans
Przyrembel,
1925.
Josef Hartwig, 1880 - 1955, Bauhaus,
manufacturer (Weimar), Chess set, 1923.
Bauhaus light fittings of pressed metal.
Mass produced under Meyer.
Gropius. Main Hall with Breuer Furniture.
Dessau. 1925-26.
Their Dessau building became a showcase for their designs. The school was
coming into its own aesthetic which joined a strong sense of composition
with clean, modern designs easily mass produced in a factory.
Torten estate, 1930.
Haus am Horn. Georg Muche, 1923.
Gropius' interest was to
industrialize the building process
for low cost housing. In the
Bauhaus Exhibition of 1923, he
and Adolf Meyer introduced
prefabricated housing units to
address Germany’s growing
housing crisis.
Georg Muche introduced Haus am
Horn that has no servants' rooms,
corridors, or staircases. It
consists of seven small rooms and
a living room in the middle. It
reflects the socialist ideals held by
the majority of the faculty.
New spaces for the new unified
German worker.
1933 - Police search
the Bauhaus on the
orders of the Dessau
district attorney’s
office, 32 students
are detained for 1 to
2 days and an
application made for
the closure of the
Bauhaus.
Ludwig Mies van der
Rohe dissolves the
Bauhaus at the start
of the summer
semester with the
masters’ consent.
Yamawaki. The End of the Dessau Bauhaus. 1932.
After the school’s closing in 1933,
many of its artists moved to the
United States.
The New Bauhaus, founded in 1937 in
Chicago by Moholy-Nagy, was the
immediate successor to the Bauhaus.
The complete curriculum
developed by Walter Gropius in
Germany was adopted and
further developed, aiming at the
education of the widely oriented
universal designer.
The methods which came from
the German Bauhaus were
adopted in manifold modified
form by other American schools.
The Bauhaus is mainly
responsible for the gradual
reduction of the until then
unchallenged predominance in
the United States of the BeauxArts tradition.
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L�aszlo� Moholy-Nagy,
School prospectus "the
new bauhaus", Chicago
1937/1938
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The Bauhaus masters on the roof of the Bauhaus building in Dessau.
From the left: Josef Albers, Hinnerk Scheper, Georg Muche, Las�zlo�
Moholy-Nagy, Herbert Bayer, Joost Schmidt, Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer,
Vassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Lyonel Feininger, Gunta Stolzl and Oskar
Schlemmer.