8.1 Modernism and the Early 20th Century

Modernism

• philosophical, as well as an art movement from the late 19th to the mid-20th century.

• design for the present and eliminate elements of the past (historicism, tradition, academicism, style)

• experimented with new forms of expression

• characterized by industrialization, rapid social change, advances in science and the social sciences, as well as reactions to the horrors of World War I

Modernist Architecture

function of buildings, approached from an analytical viewpoint, honest use of materials, elimination of ornament and decoration, and openness to structural innovation

Chicago School of Architecture

• skyscraper architecture (buildings with 10-20 floors)

• 1879-1910 by designer-engineer William Le Baron Jenney

Skyscrapers

developed as an answer to rebuilding the city after:

    1. great fire of 1871

    2. growth in population

    3. introduction of the elevator by Elisha Otis

    4. drop in the price of steel

William Le Baron Jenney

• Home Insurance Building in Chicago (1884-85), first high-rise in America to use a metal frame.

• pioneered the use of terracotta and iron to reduce the risk of skyscraper fires.

Henry Hobson Richardson

• Marshall Field Wholesale Store (1887)

• “Richardson Romanesque”

Daniel H. Burnham

• Reliance Building (1895) in Chicago

• Flatiron Building (1902) in New York

Louis Sullivan

• created a new "modern" aesthetic for high-rise towers. Adopting the credo "form follows function"

• Auditorium Building - New York

• Prudential (Guaranty) Building  - New York

Auguste Perret & Gustav Perret

• pioneers in using reinforced concrete

• The Théâtre des Champs-Élysées (1913)

• The Church of Notre-Dame du Raincy (1929)

Otto Wagner and Adolf Loos

• Viennese architects who rejected traditional styles and took a more rational approach to architecture, favoring practicality and function

• Austrian Postal Savings Bank

• Looshaus

Frank Lloyd Wright

• organic architecture - creating harmony within the different parts of a building, and between the building and its surroundings

• Unity Temple

• Larkin Building

Wiener Werkstätte

• formed by architect Josef Hoffmann and designer Koloman Moser

• creation of the Gesamtkunstwerk, or "total work of art," that sought to create a unified aesthetic across an entire designed environment

• artistic production of utilitarian items in a wide range of media

• Palais Stoclet

Futurist Architecture

• Antonio Sant'Elia

• long horizontal lines & streamlined forms, influenced by the machine age

Art Deco

• Exposition Internationale des Arts décoratifs et Industriels Modernes (International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts) held in Paris in 1925

• embraced all types of devorative art & was influenced by cubism, futurism & elements of ancient art

• represented luxury, glamour, exuberance, and faith in social and technological progress

• The Empire State Building by Shreve, Lamb, and Harmon

• Chrysler Building by William van Alen

• UST Central Seminary Building

Expressionist Architecture

• merged in Germany and the Low Countries following the social, political, and economic upheavals after Germany’s defeat in World War I.

• rebelled against the functionalist industrial-style structures of modernist architecture, preferring more sinuous or highly articulated forms

• monolithic forms, inspired by nature with sculptural dynamism

Erich Mendelson

Einstein Tower in Potsdam, Germany

Peter Behrens

AEG Turbine Factory in Berlin, Germany

Johan Friedrich Hoger (Fritz Hoger)

Chilehaus in Hamburg, Germany

De Stijl (Neoplasticism) Architecture

• to establish a compositional methodology applicable to both fine art and decorative art

• characterized by austere geometrical shapes. right angles, & primary colors

Jacobus Johannes Pieter Oud

• Weissenhof Estates

• Cafe de Unie

Gerrit Rietveld

• Riet Schröder House

• Red and Blue Chair

• Zigzag Chair

Bauhaus

• german for “house of building”

• design school founded by Walter Gropius in Weimar in 1919

• taught a fusion of arts & crafts, between “fine” and “applied” arts

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe

• last director of Bauhaus

• “less is more”

• “God is in the details”

Totalitarian Architecture

• emerged in the 1920s and 1930s, such as Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and the People’s Republic of China

• Architectural design under the regimes of dictators like Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, and Chairman Mao was designed to awe their political subjects and impress foreign visitors

• Buildings had to be conceived and built on a gargantuan scale and often incorporated elements of Greek architecture.

• embodied the fantasies and megalomania of the political leader.

New Reich Chancellery

Albert Speer, Berlin

Moscow State University

Lev Vladimirovich Rudnev