Women of the bauhaus

Influences Of The Bauhuas Of the modern age

Women of the bauhaus

Gender sexuality and the first counter cultural movemnt of the 21st century

Contents

.women of the bauhaus ch1

.gender expression in the bauhaus ch2

.bauhasu the first counter cultural movemnt ch2

fig2: neue muesum entrance

This monograph is designed to complement the work showcased in the “Bauhaus 1919-2023 radical innovations in design education” exhibition in the Neuse Museum.

This monograph will explore the women of the Bauhaus with a key focus on Lou Scheper Bergkamp and the influence the Bauhaus movement had on the countercultural movements of the last century exploring gender, sexuality and the aesthetic influence the Bauhaus had on counterculture.

The women of the Bauhaus are rarely discussed or credited for their work unless they are masters such as Anni Albers in this monograph I discuss work done by Lou Scheper Bremenkamp mainly focused on her life with a brief overview of some work done by assisted by images of some of her work. I cover her entire life from her birth up until her death in west berlin

The second half of this monograph is centered on the people who attended the Bauhaus and how they shocked the world at the time with how they chose to express themselves, the unconventional haircuts clothes and disposition of the people studying there ,how the might not invented drag but they made it their own artform , I also go over why this was so controversial Also, in this part of the monography I present the long-lasting effects of the Bauhaus movement on our culture. I explore the influences it might have had on subcultures in the entire 20th century from the free love movement to the influence the design aspects of the school have made on music-based subcultures such as the punks of the seventies to the goths of the eighties.

The bauhaus even one hundred years later lives on the displumes they helped shape and even the disciplines created there. Even though we have advanced so much since the time of the Bauhaus, the teaching techniques pioneered, they are still relevant to us now showing how forward thinking and innovative the Bauhaus really was.

We hope u enjoy our exhibition and find yourself with a new appreciation for the Bauhaus and more specifically the women of the Bauhaus.

The Neuse Museum

:lou scheper berkenkamp obras

Women of the bauhaus

In the first two years the Council of Masters passed some major resolutions benefiting the large numbers of hopeful women students. ln his first cost estimate for the Bauhaus, Gropius had reckoned with ‘50 ladies and 100 gentlemen’; in practice, the Bauhaus took as many women as men, since the new Weimar Constitution guaranteed women unrestricted freedom of study. Academies could no longer - as they had been able to do before the War-refuse women’s entry, and many women seized the new opportunities now open to them

In his first speech for the Bauhaus students Gropius made express reference to the women present. His notes referred to ‘no special regard for ladies, all craftsmen in work, ‘absolute equality of status, and therefore absolute equality of responsibility as early as September 1920, however, Gropius was suggesting to the

Council of Masters that ‘selection should be more rigorous right from the start, particularly in the case of the female sex, already over-represented in terms of numbers’. He further recommended that no ‘unnecessary experiments’ should be made, and that women should be sent direct from the Vorkurs to the weaving workshop (ills., p. 40 and 41), with pottery and bookbinding as possible alternatives. But the bookbinding workshop was dissolved in 1922 and Gropius and Marcks, head of the pottery workshop, had agreed in October 1923 to admit ‘no women at all if possible into the workshop, both for their sakes and for the sake of.

that helped us move forward?

1901 Born in Wesel, Germany

Grammar school/school graduation Abitur

1920 Bauhaus Weimar

Mural painting workshop

1922 she marries Hinnerk Scheper

The couple leaves the bauhaus

First picture letters »Phantastiken«

1925

Hinnerk Scheper becomes master of the mural painting workshop at the Bauhaus Dessau

1927 they move into a master house

Lou Scheper-Berkenkamp works in Oskar Schlemmer’s stage workshop, especially in costume and stage design

1929–1931

Stays in Moscow, focus on colour design; text contributions for the »Moskauer Rundschau«

From 1933 free artist in Berlin

As of 1948 publication of children’s books by Ernst Wunderlich, Leipzig

1951–1970

Member of the board of the Berlin art association »Der Ring«

1956-1969 co-responsible for the design of the great berlin art exhibition

fig4 :lou scheper berkenkamp bauhaus archive image

Lou scheper was a student in the bauhaus from its infancy enrolling in the school in 1920 while at the bauhaus she honed her signature style of childlike illustration collage and paintings what picasso strived his entire life to achieve she had mastered in her 20s “It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.-pablo picasso

While attending the bauhaus she studied under Johannes Itten, Lyonel Feininger, Paul Klee and Georg Muche , she also met her future husband in the bauhaus . she met heinrik Schlemmer while working on a mural painting workshop . She also later met Oskar Schlemmer while working on a stage workshop .The couple later left the bauhaus so that lou could focus on her artistic works ,after a couple of years and heinrik being appointed the head of the murals division in the bauhaus desu the couple had their first child beretta in 1926

After Georg Muche, master woodcarver, left for Berlin in 1927, a semi-detached house became available and the Scheper family was able to move in. Lou Scheper-Berkenkamp worked - without matriculation - in the stage workshop of the Bauhaus under the direction of Oskar Schlemmer. Lou supported an important area of Schlemmer’s work with the development of costumes,he designed and directed costumes and sets for the plays Ojdar“ and Circus and directed. In the group exhibition Junge Bauhausmaler (Young Bauhaus Painter), in Halle (Saale), she took 1928 part.[3] She also created also a number of children’s books until the couple’s 1929 departure from Dessau. Family Scheper remained associated with the Bauhaus until its closure in 1933 and beyond.

fig 5 : moscow cremlin

scheper berkenkamp bauhaus archive image

fig7 : :lou scheper berkenkamp bauhaus archive image 4

later life

In 1951 Lou Scheper-Berkenkamp was one of the co-founders of the Berlin artists’ association “The Ring”, of which she was a member of the board until 1970. The members included Wolf Röhricht, Siegmund Lympasik, Erhard Groß Wilhelm, Arthur Fauser,Hans Szym, Alfred Kubin,Ulrich Knispel, Otto Eglau, Erich Waske, Georg von StrykPeter August Helmstedt Arno Mohr , Walter Wellenstein Erich Fritz Reuter, Gerhart Schreiter and Peter Steinforth. She later worked closely with several artist in the haus am waldsee in berlin-zehenndorf .lou was actively involved in the professional association of visual arts in berlin up until 1970

After the death of her husband lou took over his duties at the great berlin art exhibition but what many don’t know is that during both of their entire careers the reason heinrik was more renowned and better known is that according to her family she preferred to work in his shadow to push his accomplishments further but many of his accomplishments were also hers as there are records of her assisting him with all his work an example of this is when henrik was appointed in the “Consultation Centre for Colour in Architecture and Cityscapes”in the soviet union while working there she helped him design the colour pallet that would be used for much of the soviet architecture . The reason i bring this up is that there isnt many books written directly about her but her impact is felt everywhere , from helping shape the form bauhaus would take to helping her husband lou scheper berkenkamp can be seen as the mother of the bauhaus.

Chapter 2

Gender expression in the bauhaus the catalyist of the century of counter culture

Gender in the bauhaus like many if not all the disciplines was highly expressive and controversial for the time ,Gender and sexuality were expressed openly in many forms such as some of the students dressing in drag this expression of both sexuality and gender is seen as the building blocks that lead to the queer revolutions of the 1960s and up until today

fig 9 : mujeres de la bauhaus

fig 10 : bauhaus dessau 1926

An examination of the crisis of masculinity at the Bauhaus and links it to a broader crisis in patriarchy after the First World War. Bauhaus reminiscences and depictions of Bauhaus students and buildings in the catalog of the 1938 MoMA Bauhaus exhibition show a re-enactment of war trauma in Bauhaus theatre and festivals. These and other experiments led to radical and subsequently conservative revisions of masculine identity. The paper suggests that the construction of a new disciplinary identity through institutional and media reproduction rather than its economically limited innovations in mass production forms the real legacy of the Bauhaus for the twentieth century. The essay draws heavily on personal statements by Bauhaus students and masters, and juxtaposes these with theoretical analyses of masculine formation. This technique at least in part allows for the theorists and historical subjects to speak for thselves.

This breakdown of the masculine identity inspired all of the students to breakdown and examine their own gender expression many of the women at the Bauhaus shaved their heads or had masc presenting haircuts this might be seen as something normal today but at the time it was deeply controversial and revolutionary it is because of these women a hundred years ago that today that many women can express themselves however they like not without judgment but they are safe to do so women during the bauhaus were see as strange or insane because they wanted to cross dress

This is important because this gender expression was adopted by many movemnts after the bauhaus,s time had ended

fig 11 :bauhaus art students 1927

fig

the bauhaus effects on the counter cultural movements of the 21st century

fig 13 :bauhaus bela lugosis dead

Let’s focus on the punks and goths for now. Many of the illustrative and collage techniques that emerged as a product of the Bauhaus can be seen in many posters, album covers and even the aesthetic of the punk movement. A perfect example of this can be seen in many of the posters produced and released by the Dead Kennedys, when looking at their posters the influence of the Bauhaus is Prominet when looking at the posters the influence of Bauhaus masters, the collage, and illustrations skills of women such as Lou Scheper to the textures and color pallets of experts such as Gunta Stölzl and Annie Albers needless to say the Bauhaus was not their only inspiration but the Bauhaus effects can be seen

The effects on the goth movement as the band credited as founding and perfecting both the aesthetic and feel of goth movement was directly influenced by the Bauhaus as the are named directly after bauhaus

The band formed under the name Bauhaus 1919, in reference to the first operating year of the German art school Bauhaus, but they shortened this name within a year of formation. Their 1979 debut single “Bela Lugosi’s Dead” is considered one of the harbingers of gothic rock music and has been influential on contemporary goth culture. Their debut album, In the Flat Field, is regarded as one of the first gothic rock records. Their 1981 second (about 33 minutes) album Mask expanded their sound by incorporating a wider variety of instruments—such as keyboards, saxophone and acoustic guitar—and experimenting with funk-inspired rhythms on tracks like “Kick in the Eye Thought the name its the only influence the bauhaus school had on the band of the same name the attitudes on gender and expression live on though them, shown here their lead singer would often do things that are/weren’t seen as very manly in many promotions and posters the lead singer peter murphy can be seen in makeup and often in either torn ill-fitting clothes or in clothes designed for women as a form of self expreesion, frreedom and rebellion exactly what the bauhaus is to me .

fig 16: 80’s punk

Final words

Thought the bauhaus is gone we can still explore and examine the ways the people of that time saw gender ,sexuality liberty and want of all people to be themselves that is what bauhuas means to many people who grew up surrounded by the the ideas ,ideals and designs made there .

fig 17 : sudno by molchat doma

fig 18 : workers’ party foundation monument

https://www.bauhaus-bookshelf.org/lou-scheper-berkenkamp-english.html

https://www.noz.de/deutschland-welt/kultur/artikel/421456/vom-bauhaus-in-die-welt-der-fantasie#gallery&11994&0&421456

elizabeth otto haunted bauhaus

Bauhaus Women: A Global Perspective by elizebeth otto

List of images

fig 0 : bauhaus archive

fig.1 lou scheper berkenkamp archive image

fig2: neue muesum entrance

fig 3 :lou scheper berkenkamp obras

fig4 :lou scheper berkenkamp bauhaus archive image 2

fig 5 : moscow cremlin

fig6 :lou scheper berkenkamp bauhaus archive image 3

fig7 : :lou scheper berkenkamp bauhaus archive image 4

fig 8 :lou scheper berkenkamp bauhaus archive image 5

fig :9 bauhaus queer culture

fig 10 :: mujeres de la bauhaus

fig 11 : bauhaus dessau 1926

fig 12 :bauhaus art students 1927

fig 13 : two lovers

fig 14 :bauhaus bela lugosis dead

fig 15 :punk rock flyers

fig 16: bauhaus band

fig 17: 80’s punk

fig 18 : sudno by molchat doma

fig 19 : workers’ party foundation monument

lou schper pg 1-17

Wgender expression in the bauhaus pg 17-25

bauhaus modern impact on punk /goth pgs 25-29

Published in 2023

Edited by Eabha Cusack for the Neue muesum in Berlin Germany atInstitute of Art, Design + Technology

Kill Avenue, Dún Laoghaire, Co. Dublin, Ireland, A96 KH79Phone: + 353 1 239 4000Email: info@iadt.iehttp://www.iadt.ieCopyright © 2023

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No part of this publication may be reproduced to be transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.Text & cover design: Eabha Cusack

Bauhaus Archive Berlin Museum of Design