HENRY
VAN DE VELDE
Sabine Walter Werner Adriaenssens
Thomas Föhl
‘Like a powder trail, the name Van de Velde cropped up in the columns of the leading German newspapers and in the reports of the most eminent critics. From one day to the next I enjoyed in Germany a reputation that was to expand and produce a pilgrimage of visitors to Bloemenwerf wishing to meet and discuss with this apostle of stylistic innovation.’
— h enry van de Velde on the breakthrough in Germany, in his m émoires, 1897
Wherever life took him, Henry van de Velde is reputed never to have closed his eyes at night without first reading from the book on his night table. And he never denied that, pinned to the wall above his head - at all stages of his life – were three verses from one of August von Platen’s most moving poems: ‘He whose eyes have beholden the beauty ....’. This calligraphy text had been a present from one of his students, a book-binder. Over the course of his life, Van de Velde wrote myriad articles on theories and visions; these works would become the basis for more than a dozen of his books.
At the age of sixty, he sought to summarize the decisive importance that books had had on his life, writing that books could stimulate people through their usefulness and captivate them through their beauty. They were the ‘pain quotidien culturel’, the cultural sustenance we need in a life bent on efficiency and effectiveness, as well as a ‘monument de la pensée’, a monument to thought. Our restless minds, capable of moving mountains and linking up letters, and which distinguish us from all other living species, were nothing without the means to pronounce what they have to say: this means, of course, is the book. And the means to celebrate these capabilities: the beautiful book. One of his customers, with years of experience in the field, was to write that ‘he shared Van de Velde’s love of beautiful books’, especially as the artist ‘always took responsibility for designing a book, right down to the very last detail’.1
Our interest focuses mainly on two questions: Why did Henry van de Velde design books? And how did he design them?
Before looking more closely at the three stages of his almost fifty-year interest in book design and some of the milestones of his development in this field, we should first note four guiding theories. Without knowledge of these, any detailed analysis of the books he designed risks becoming merely circumstantial.
The first and overriding theory concerns the meaning of ‘beautiful’, mentioned above without further consideration. In his early years, Van de Velde had become convinced that beauty and functionality were by no means mutually exclusive, and in fact went hand in hand. Van de Velde termed as ‘beautiful’ any object whose form matched its functionality ‘without any of the figural or overloaded ornamentation seen previously’, irrespective of whether it was a tool, chair or book. In his view, ‘matching form and functionality will always produce beauty’.2
The second theory derives from the first, and similarly entails a revolution in the traditional understanding of art. If that which is completely functional is perfectly beautiful, this meant that Van de Velde could transcend
the then existing distinction between the three traditional arts (architecture, sculpture and painting) and the ‘arts décoratifs’, also deprecatingly known as the ‘arts mineurs’. This step was of decisive importance for Van de Velde’s relationship to the book. It led him to forego painting in 1892 and, in the summer of that year, develop his first bookbinding design - for Max Elskamp’s Dominical, a volume of poetry and, in Van de Velde’s eyes, a work of art.
The third theory complements the first two, directing attention to our perception of a work of art. With beauty lying in functionality, and with an object designed to be functional being able to become a work of art, Van de Velde no longer wished to work only for wealthy individuals, the ‘connoisseurs’ Instead, he desired that his visions and works be available to as wide a public as possible. His top priority became to supply this target group with works of art, especially books designed by him, that communicated to them what he called ‘modern serenity’ (moderne Heiterkeit)3, a sentiment that Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, two of Van de Velde’s central influences, had upheld as being the highest attainable: ‘Heiterkeit, güldene, komm…’ (Friedrich Nietzsche). This theory similarly underpinned his intention to attract as wide a readership as possible through the design of a book’s cover. We would fail to recognize the strongest impetus of Van de Velde’s work were we to focus solely on its aesthetical aspects and ignore this ethical component.
With his fourth theory, Van de Velde established a link to the first theory, directing our attention to the design of a book. Which stylistic means, which Kunstgriff, are needed to transform the functional into the beautiful, the beautiful into the functional? By the age of thirty, Van de Velde already knew the answer: not superimposed, figural and banal ornamentation, but powerful, distinctive, vital lines. Why did such ornamentation seem banal? Because, in the eyes of Van de Velde, ornamentation had been the cause of a steady
209 1893
Max Elskamp, Salutations dont d’angéliques, Brussels, Lacomblez
Klassik Stiftung Weimar, Herzogin Anna Amalia Bibliothek
210 1893
Cover of the magazine Van nu en straks, Brussels, Xavier Havermans Collection of Pascal and Louise de Sadeleer
demise of aestheticism, beginning with the Renaissance, continuing through the Baroque and Rococo periods, and culminating in the dreadful combination of all these various styles and their ornamental elements in the nineteenth century. Why did lines seem so vital? Because, according to Van de Velde’s theory, a line had its own power, directing the artist’s hand, triggered by temperament or mood, by an example from nature or by a functional requirement. But ultimately a line was, in Van de Velde’s words, ‘driven by a subconscious power’.4 His favourite illustration of this takes us far back in time, to the very first instance of someone drawing a line in the sand with their toe, tracing the unceasing ebb and flow of the waves. In doing so, this person learned how to draw inspiration from tracing the elements, artistically expressing enthusiasm and passion through powerful sweeping lines, through curving ins and outs - and how to transpose these lines onto such objects as vases. Nearly all of Van de Velde’s future designs for book covers would be characterized by this play of
211 1892
01 Sam van Deventer to Herta Hesse, 5.11.1963. Van de VeldeGesellschaft, Hagen.
02 Henry van de Velde: Was ich will, in: Die Zeit, Vienna, 9.3.1901.
03 Henry van de Velde: Der neue Stil, in: Van de Velde 1907a, p. 71.
04 Henry van de Velde: Das neue ornament, in: Van de Velde 1901, p. 97 f.
01 of note here is the comprehensive 6-volume Catalogue Raisonné on Henry van de Velde’s architecture and craft work, the first volume of which appeared in 2009 (cf. Föhl/Neumann 2009). The second volume, on textiles, is due to appear in autumn 2013, with the third on ceramics due in autumn 2014. Also of note is the – albeit incomplete - ‘Gesamtwerk’, Pecher 1981. For more on Van de Velde’s typography and bookbinding work, see Weber 1994, as well as the more comprehensive Brinks 2007.
02 As it is now difficult to access many of Van de Velde’s early texts on account of their rareness, in most cases reference is made to copies. These barely accessible texts include some of his main texts, such as his Déblaiement d’Art manifesto, which first appeared as a privately financed print in Brussels in 1894, as well as his Aperçus en vue d’une synthèse d’art (Brussels 1896), Die Renaissance im modernen Kunstgewerbe (Berlin 1901) and his Kunstgewerbliche Laienpredigten (Leipzig 1902). Available as copies: Déblaiement d’Art suivi de La triple offense à la beauté, Le nouveau, Max Elskamp, La voie sacrée, La colonne, Brussels 1979; Kunstgewerbliche Laienpredigten, Berlin 1999; Formules de la beauté architectonique moderne, Brussels 1978; Formules d’une esthétique moderne, Brussels 1923; Pages de doctrine, Brussels 1942.
03 See Ploegaerts/Puttemans 1987 for a catalogue of Van de Velde’s architectural works and identified interior furnishings.
04 The list of contemporary works on Van de Velde and his oeuvre includes (in the chronological order of their appearance): osthaus 1920; Maurice Casteels: Henry van de Velde, Brussels 1932; Herman Teirlinck: Henry van de Velde, Brussels 1959; Hammacher 1967. More recent publications include: Sembach 1989; Steven Jacob: Henry Van de Velde. Wonen als kunstwerk, een woonplaats voor kunst, Louvain 1996; Föhl 2010a. For biographical texts, see Van de Velde 1962; Van Loo 1992, 1995, and Ploegaerts 1999a.
05 Cf. Nikolaus Pevsner: Pioneers of Modern Design, Harmondsworth 1975, 1981; also: The Sources of Modern Architecture and Design, New York/Toronto 1968; Sigfried Giedion: Space, Time and Architecture, the Growth of a new Tradition, Cambridge/ Mass. 1967; Frank Russell (Ed.): L’architecture de
Architecture, though just one of the many facets of Henry van de Velde’s oeuvre that would emerge after he had forsaken painting plays an important role in the artist’s career, alongside other applied arts such as furniture design, textiles, metalwork, cutlery, ceramics, jewellery, lighting, typography and bookbinding.1 Moreover, van de Velde also authored myriad essays and books detailing his creative thoughts.2 His architectural oeuvre is today sufficiently well-known to allow a comprehensive opinion on his influence on Modernism to be established.3 Beginning in the 1890s and stretching to the late 1930s, his oeuvre absorbed the various currents of the period, without pandering to the whims of fashion.4 Particularly astonishing is that most books on the history of modern architecture portray van de Velde as a pioneer of Modernism, while in Germany his name is generally associated with Jugendstil, and in Latin countries with the brief era of Art Nouveau.5 The numerous works devoted to him have been able to correct this image to a degree.6 This article, embracing the uniqueness of Van de Velde’s thinking, presents his main projects and most important buildings. In doing so, it concentrates on houses - regarded by the architect as his greatest challenge -, looking mainly at his publications on the subject. This will position us to follow his thoughts on the New Style and ‘common-sense design’, as well as his hitherto unpublished theory on form and ornamentation.7 Against this background, particular attention will be focussed on the houses Van de Velde designed for his personal use, designs for which, unhindered by the constraints of customer wishes, he was able to fully unleash his creativity.8 This approach has added appeal because his career as an architect began with the design of his own house, and because private houses in general played an important role in his oeuvre. In all these works, Van de Velde had little intention of dictating a specific style; he focussed instead on tailoring each house’s style to the wishes of those who were to live in them. This approach was summed up by Walter Benjamin in the following words: ‘For Van de Velde a house is no less than a plastic representation of the owner’s personality. And the ornament applied to the house is the same as a signature under a painting.’9
This study endeavours to provide a more precise picture of a style of architecture based on a harmony of form and common sense, taking up Van de Velde’s philosophy of ‘common-sense beauty’ (form follows function) via its redefinition of the role of
ornamentation. This ‘New Style’ is found in many different shapes and forms throughout the twentieth century.
HE n RY VA n DE VELDE’S TRAI n I n G
After completing his studies at the Antwerp Academy, Van de Velde spent time in Paris in 1884, where he was to be seen in the atelier of Emile Carolus-Duran and in various circles of artists and musicians.10 Upon returning to Belgium, he was admitted into Octave Maus’s Les Vingt group of artists, with whom he exhibited a number of times until 1893.11 He made a number of acquaintances in literary (Mallarmé, Verhaeren, Verlaine) and artistic circles (Finch, Khnopff, Rops, Seurat), worked as a correspondent for the magazine L’Art Moderne and became a founding member of the Association pour l’Art He exhibited in The Hague, wrote for the magazine Van Nu en Straks (which belonged to his friend Auguste Vermeylen), created his Angels' Watch wall hanging, lectured, presented a course entitled Cours d’arts d’industrie et d’ornementation, and published his first Kunstgewerbliche Laienpredigt (Lay sermon on the arts and crafts) and his Déblaiement d’Art, a treatise for a new conception of the arts.12
FIRST STE p S AS A n ARCHITECT
253 1927 ‘28
Villa Schinkel, Blankenese near Hamburg
Royal Library of Belgium, Archives and French Literature Museum
In 1895, Van de Velde began drawing up plans for his first house, Bloemenwerf. In his early thirties and recently married, his thoughts often focused on giving up painting and moving on to other artistic fields. However, his major aspiration was to construct a home for his family which met his personal requirements.13 Bloemenwerf , despite a few mishaps that can be excused on account of this being the first attempt of an autodidact, was a profession of faith to Van de Velde’s new environment, described in Déblaiement d’Art. The house’s appeal lay more in the simplicity of its form and the complete lack of ornamentation on the three-gabled facade, than in its resemblance to the cottages designed by Charles Voysey.14 The uniqueness of Van de Velde’s design is in the building’s polygonal form and its open central room, from which a staircase leads up to a showcase-lined gallery giving access to the upstairs rooms. In 1901, in the plans for the Zeemeeuw house in Scheveningen for Dr. W. Leuring, Van de Velde used a simplified polygonal form and provided a better connection of the two floors through a double staircase.15 Other architectural works executed in the late 1890s are listed in the footnote.16
At the time he was moving into Bloemenwerf, in early 1896, Van de Velde published his long essay, Aperçus en vue d’une synthèse d’art, in which he outlined his thoughts on the need to redefine art, so as to give it a new role in society, a role based on the libertarian idea of the quest for the
