Discover Germany | Design Feature | Bauhaus 100
Bauhaus Dessau. Photo: © Moonglow
Bauhaus 100 Even though the Staatliches Bauhaus, commonly known simply as Bauhaus, only existed for 14 years, it revolutionised artistic and architectural thinking and work in the 20th century. In 2019, Bauhaus turns 100 years old.
taught Bauhaus’s famous required course on the fundamentals of colour, form and material.
TEXT: WIBKE CARTER
The Bauhaus Museum (moving into a new building in spring 2019) has a collection of some 11,000 Bauhaus objects, including the world’s oldest collection, authorised by Gropius. Thuringia’s Hauptstaatsarchiv holds documents and materials relevant to the early years while Haus am Horn, which in 1923 was built as a showcase home, is the very first building constructed based on Bauhaus designs. The main building of the
Weimar The foundation stone for the Bauhaus was already laid in 1902 by Henry van de Velde, when he established the Kunstgewerbliches Seminar (College of Applied Arts). But it was not until 1919 that German architect Walter Gropius merged the Grand Ducal School of Arts and Crafts and the Weimar Academy of Fine Art into the Staatliches Bauhaus. The new school combined the fine arts, crafts and design into one institution with the aim of creating a Gesamtkunstwerk, or total work of art. The Bauhaus was more than just a place to teach and learn. It was a lifestyle, the beginning of the art school as an alternative way of life. “It was a commune, a spiritual 14 | Issue 70 | January 2019
movement, a radical approach to art in all its forms, a philosophical centre”, journalist Tom Wolfe wrote in his book From Bauhaus to Our House. Students, half of them women, lived together, worked together and held legendary parties, masked balls, kite processions and experimental light and music evenings. The teaching staff was of the highest calibre. The initial faculty, consisting of Johannes Itten, Lyonel Feininger, Gerhard Marcks and Gropius, were joined by Oskar Schlemmer, Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky within three years of opening. Eccentric Swiss painter Itten shaped the school’s early Expressionist direction and
Bauhaus-Album, desk. Photo: © Klassik Stiftung Weimar