12 - Bauhaus

Friday April 21st 2023

Bauhaus, in full Staatliches Bauhaus, school of design, architecture, and applied arts that existed in Germany from 1919 to 1933.

The Bauhaus was founded by the architect Walter Gropius, who combined two schools, the Weimar Academy of Arts and the Weimar School of Arts and Crafts, into what he called the Bauhaus, or “house of building,” a name derived by inverting the German word Hausbau, “building of a house.” Gropius’s “house of building” included the teaching of various crafts, which he saw as allied to architecture, the matrix of the arts. By training students equally in art and in technically expert craftsmanship, the Bauhaus sought to end the schism between the two.

Two other important leaders of the Bauhaus are Hannes Meyer and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. These three figures also reflect three cities where the Bauhaus was held:

1. Weimar until 1925

2. Dessau through 1932

3. Berlin in its final months

Gropius deals with 1 and 2. The nomadic character of the school characterizes also its evolution and production.

The philosophy of the Bauhaus

As said, according to Gropius’ idea, the Bauhaus was born as s mix of school of applied arts (forming technicians/artisans) dealing with craft, and a classical academia (based on the teaching of the theory of art). The school is a union of these two experiences, having craftsmanship as a common base.

The manifesto of the Bauhaus was written by Gropius, who was a scholar of Behrens and had experience of the different trends of the time. Thanks to Behrens, he had the opportunity of joining a group of artists in Weimar, where

the Bauhaus was born after the end of the WWI. After Germany's defeat in World War I the administrative and bureaucratic asset of unified Germany had collapsed and was replaced by the young and ambitious Weimar republic. A renewed liberal spirit allowed an upsurge of radical experimentation in all the arts, which had been suppressed by the old regime. Many Germans of left-wing views were influenced by the cultural experimentation that followed the Russian Revolution, such as constructivism. Such influences can be overstated: Gropius did not share these radical views, and said that Bauhaus was entirely apolitical. Just as important was the influence of the 19th-century English designer William Morris (1834–1896), who, influenced by John Ruskin, founded the Arts and Crafts movement preaching no distinction between form and function.

THE MANIFESTO

The ultimate aim of all visual arts is the complete building! To embellish buildings was once the noblest function of the fine arts; they were the indispensable components of great architecture. Today the arts exist in isolation, from which they can be rescued only through the conscious, cooperative effort of all craftsmen. Architects, painters, and sculptors must recognize anew and learn to grasp the composite character of a building both as an entity and in its separate parts. Only then will their work be imbued with the architectonic spirit which it has lost as “salon art.”

Architects, sculptors, painters, we all must return to the crafts! For art is not a “profession.” There is no essential difference between the artist and the craftsman. The artist is an exalted craftsman. In rare moments of inspiration, transcending the consciousness of his will, the grace of heaven may cause his work to blossom into art. But proficiency in a craft is essential to every artist.

Let us then create a new guild of craftsmen without the class distinctions that raise an arrogant barrier between craftsman and artist! Together let us desire, conceive, and create the new structure of the future, which will embrace architecture and sculpture and painting in one unity and which will one day rise toward heaven from the hands of a million workers like the crystal symbol of a new faith.

Immediately after the first sentences we encounter the word "Craftsman", the keyword of the whole manifesto, and a figure different from the architect.

The visual arts (painting sculpture and architecture) create together - in a collective effort - architecture, the result of the collaboration of different crafts. The craftsman are artisans and technicians at service of the society. Gropius invites the different arts to come back to a craft state and research, being more primitive and less refined for the final product. There is an incredible level of pronunciation of metaphors: the words testify about the project of this group and are flanked by a drawing made by a friend of Gropius who participated to the foundation of the Bauhaus. It is the expression/manifestation through drawings of a medieval cathedral of almost a crystal shape. It is a collective symbol: the representation of a society realized by craftsman, without distinction in artists, sculptors and architects: the simple result of the collaboration of artisans.

All these aspect pass through the contextualization of the movement in the history, that in this period has been characterized by the world conflicts, the economic crisis, uprising deaths and civil wars, the urbanization and industrialization. These aspects created an incredible sense of uncertainty.

The Bauhaus wants to propose itself as a collective experiment with the desire of creating a democratic society based on socialism. It is not just an answer to the political agenda but also the answer to the necessity of representing society in a wider sense. Indeed, the previous experience of the Deutscher Werkbund was a workshop, not an atelier, comprehending a manufacture addressed to the bourgeoisie. The Bauhaus wants to represent also the working-class districts, losing the monumentality of the architectural production of the time, in favour of a more inclusive representation of the society.

DIE STADTKRONE

The belief was that art and architecture can participate to the creation of the new society.

Die Stadtkrone or City Crown is a concept of urban planning put forward by German expressionist architects, and particularly championed by Bruno Taut in the early part of the 20th century. Taut made the concept into the title of his first Book in 1917, published in 1919.

This essay was written during the most tragic moment of the humankind, the war. It depicts a utopian society that reflects itself into a collective symbol: a crystal-like construction made in iron and glass that blends with the context, creating a new balance between nature and architecture.

Taut's idea was to establish a garden city with an intellectual and artist city centre beyond the concentration of cultural institutions. He suggested creating a representation of the city and its citizens in a virtually religious idealization, comparable to a gothic cathedral of Asian pagodas.

The architecture of form might have some kind of redemption intentions. The form is a kind of redemptive form that crystallizes all our anxieties and leads to salvation.

This concept receives the influence of the experience of the theatre of Wagner, where all the arts are condensed. The interior of the theatre represents a moment of cathartic union among arts.

The relationship with the industrial world

Another important aspect to consider, in order to understand the intentions and the development of the Bauhaus is its relationship with the production in the capitalist world. Modern architect finally gave image to the industrial production through factories.

Walter Gropius, Adolph Meyer, Faguswerke, 1911

The faguswerke was designed by Gropius as soon as he finished the studies. He had the chance of experimenting with the curtain wall.

The artist and architect participate with the industrial culture to the formation of the modern design. The initiative comes directly from the government: the design helps in giving recognizability to the German products. The modern designers first formed the group of the Deutscher Werkbund, through which many famous architects passed. The Bauhaus exists on the footprint of this movement but wants a new kind of clientele: the social community of the new Weimar republic.