Celebrating 100 years of Bauhaus
“Together let us call for, devise, and create the construction of the future, comprising everything in one form: architecture, sculpture and painting.”
–Walter Gropius, Bauhaus Manifesto
Bauhaus. It’s one of those words that almost everyone has heard, but of which not everyone knows the meaning. If pressed, some might talk about art, architecture, craft, or design.
And they would be more correct than they might expect to be by saying so.
The Staatliches Bauhaus (rough translation: State-owned Building House) was founded by an architect—though it did not initially have an architecture department. It started in Weimar, Germany in 1919, and lasted only until 1933—just fourteen years– but its influence quickly grew for decades to encompass the world.
Modern design, modernist architecture, the visual arts, graphic design, interior design, industrial design—even typography: All were profoundly influenced by the Bauhaus movement.
Architect Water Gropius founded the Bauhaus as a school intended to facilitate Gesamtkunstwerk, or ‘Total Work of Art,” in which all the arts—including architecture—would eventually be brought together. Over its brief physical history, the school existed in three German cities: Weimar, from 1919 to 1925; Dessau, from 1925 to 1932—Hannes Meyer assumed directorship here in 1928 until Ludwig Mies van der Rohe directed the school through its move to Berlin from 1932 to 1933.
A piece written for the Getty Center’s June 2019 exhibition “Bauhaus Beginnings” theorized that the origins of the Bauhaus can be traced to the late 19th century, in “anxieties about the soullessness of modern manufacturing, and fears about art’s loss of social relevance.” The Bauhaus sought to infuse practical crafts—architecture, interior design, textiles, furniture, woodwork– with the aesthetics of fine art sculpture and painting.
The architectural influence of the designs from Bauhaus Directors Walter Gropius and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe can clearly be seen in the International Style that is so prevalent in Western architecture today. The rectilinear forms, lack of ornamentation, cantilever construction yielding a light ‘floating’ quality to buildings made of glass and steel have become iconic, and celebrated—even deemed worthy of inclusion at the Museum of Modern Art.
Other well-known artists such as Josef Albers, Wassily Kandinsky, and Paul Klee all offered their unique expertise as instructors at the Bauhaus and added to the depth and breadth of influence of the school. But the rise of the Nazi party in Germany would prove to be the undoing on the Bauhaus school: the Nazi regime were not fans, believing the school to be left-wing, radical, & potentially Socialist. Despite resistance from the Bauhaus instructors, the pressure ultimately led the Bauhaus school to close.
But today, Germany’s Nazi party is long gone. And the ideas germinated from the Bauhaus live on, spread by the students and staff who left Germany and took the Bauhaus ideas, influence, and philosophy to wherever they might emigrate.
Roos International salutes the Bauhaus movement and all of those who contributed to it. Here are some of Interlam’s architectural carved panels and metal screens that reflect this all-encompassing artistic movement.
The most basic principle of the movement of the Bauhaus school was “form follows function.” According to this idea, simple but elegant geometric shapes were designed based on the intended function or purpose of a building or an object.
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