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What is the Bauhaus:
The Bauhaus school was founded by Walter Gropius in Weimar. In spite of its name, and the fact that its founder was an architect, the Bauhaus did not have an architecture department during the first years of its existence. Nonetheless it was founded with the idea of creating a “total” work of art in which all arts, including architecture, would eventually be brought together. The Bauhaus style became one of the most influential currents in Modernist architecture and modern design. The Bauhaus had a profound influence upon subsequent developments in art, architecture, graphic design, interior design, industrial design, and typography.
The school existed in three German cities (Weimar from 1919 to 1925, Dessau from 1925 to 1932 and Berlin from 1932 to 1933), under three different architect-directors: Walter Gropius from 1919 to 1928, Hannes Meyer from 1928 to 1930 and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe from 1930 until 1933, when the school was closed by its own leadership under pressure from the Nazi regime.
The changes of venue and leadership resulted in a constant shifting of focus, technique, instructors, and politics. For instance: 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.
Ideologies of the Bauhaus:
In the annals of the twentieth-century avant-garde, the decade following upon the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 and the Armistice of 1918 was distinguished by a significant shift in the relation of modernist art to radical politics. Briefly stated, it was a shift that brought about a close but uneasy and ultimately tragic alliance between modernism in the arts and socialism in politics. From this ill-fated alliance, which had far-reaching consequences for both modernist art and the future of socialist cultural policy, neither the avant-garde nor the political Left escaped unscathed.
The Bauhaus school was founded by Walter Gropius in Weimar. In spite of its name, and the fact that its founder was an architect, the Bauhaus did not have an architecture department during the first years of its existence. Nonetheless it was founded with the idea of creating a “total” work of art in which all arts, including architecture, would eventually be brought together. The Bauhaus style became one of the most influential currents in Modernist architecture and modern design. The Bauhaus had a profound influence upon subsequent developments in art, architecture, graphic design, interior design, industrial design, and typography.
The school existed in three German cities (Weimar from 1919 to 1925, Dessau from 1925 to 1932 and Berlin from 1932 to 1933), under three different architect-directors: Walter Gropius from 1919 to 1928, Hannes Meyer from 1928 to 1930 and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe from 1930 until 1933, when the school was closed by its own leadership under pressure from the Nazi regime.
The changes of venue and leadership resulted in a constant shifting of focus, technique, instructors, and politics. For instance: 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.
Ideologies of the Bauhaus:
In the annals of the twentieth-century avant-garde, the decade following upon the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 and the Armistice of 1918 was distinguished by a significant shift in the relation of modernist art to radical politics. Briefly stated, it was a shift that brought about a close but uneasy and ultimately tragic alliance between modernism in the arts and socialism in politics. From this ill-fated alliance, which had far-reaching consequences for both modernist art and the future of socialist cultural policy, neither the avant-garde nor the political Left escaped unscathed.
-Believe in a utopian society
-form follows function
-art and design should be accessible to all
-design becomes a globally understood language.
-driven my industrial revolution, use of new materials and need to mass produce.
Who taught at the Bauhaus:
Those who worked at the school shared three clear ideals with Gropius: to stop each of the forms of art from being isolated from each other; to raise the status of crafts to the same level as that of fine arts; and to maintain contact with the leaders of industry and craft, in order to achieve independence from government control by selling designs directly to the manufacturer.
-WALTER GROPIUS
-HANNES MEYER
-MIES VAN DER ROHE
Areas of design at the Bauhaus:
focussing on some of the areas of design, architecture was ebbeded in the very foundations of the bauhaus, ‘bauhaus’ meaning house of building. It is clear that the approach of building and architectural structurs has influenced almost every area of design at the bauhas.
Although neither the Nazi Party nor Hitler himself had a cohesive architectural ‘policy’ in the 1930s, Nazi writers like Wilhelm Frick and Alfred Rosenberg had labelled the Bauhaus “un-German” and criticized its modernist styles, deliberately generating public controversy over issues like flat roofs. Increasingly through the early 1930s, they characterized the Bauhaus as a front for Communists, Russian, and social liberals. Indeed, second director Hannes Meyer was an avowed Communist, and he and a number of loyal students moved to the Soviet Union in 1930.
Under political pressure the Bauhaus was closed on the orders of the Nazi régime on April 11 1933. The closure, and the response of Mies van der Rohe, is fully documented in Elaine Hochman’s Architects of Fortune.
-form follows function
-art and design should be accessible to all
-design becomes a globally understood language.
-driven my industrial revolution, use of new materials and need to mass produce.
Who taught at the Bauhaus:
Those who worked at the school shared three clear ideals with Gropius: to stop each of the forms of art from being isolated from each other; to raise the status of crafts to the same level as that of fine arts; and to maintain contact with the leaders of industry and craft, in order to achieve independence from government control by selling designs directly to the manufacturer.
-WALTER GROPIUS
-HANNES MEYER
-MIES VAN DER ROHE
Areas of design at the Bauhaus:
focussing on some of the areas of design, architecture was ebbeded in the very foundations of the bauhaus, ‘bauhaus’ meaning house of building. It is clear that the approach of building and architectural structurs has influenced almost every area of design at the bauhas.
NESTING TABLES
The Nesting Tables were originally created by Josef Albers for the so-called Moellenhof House in Berlin during this time at Bauhaus. Nesting Tables combine clear geometrical shapes with use of colour derived from Albers' painterly oeuvre. The frame is made of solid oak, the table tops of laquered acrylic glass.
CHESS BOARD
Fascinating, aesthetic, ingenious. The objects possess all these features, yet each one has its own individual character. One first understands this when held in the hand. Apart from the concept behind them, it is the quality of the workmanship which makes Bauhaus play objects so special. Respect for the material, wood and handcrafted with extreme care, result in this unique quality.
WASSILY CHAIR
The Wassily Chair, also known as the Model B3 chair, was designed by Marcel Breuer in 1925-1926 while he was the head of the cabinet-making workshop at the Bauhaus, in Dessau, Germany. Despite popular belief, the chair was not designed for the non-objective painter Wassily Kandinsky, who was concurrently on theBauhaus faculty. However, Kandinsky had admired the completed design, and Breuer fabricated a duplicate for Kandinsky's personal quarters. The chair became known as "Wassily" decades later, when it was re-released by an Italian manufacturer named Gavina who had learned of the anecdotal Kandinsky connection in the course of its research on the chair's origins.
Downfall of the Bauhaus:
Under political pressure the Bauhaus was closed on the orders of the Nazi régime on April 11 1933. The closure, and the response of Mies van der Rohe, is fully documented in Elaine Hochman’s Architects of Fortune.
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