From the Bauhaus Museum Weimar you can see the Buchenwald concentration camp; from the Bauhaus Museum Weimar you can exactly locate the violence and inhumanity of the NSDAP. However from Bauhaus Weimar and Bauhaus Dessau and Bauhaus Berlin locating the NSDAP is a lot less straightforward; from the Bauhauses seeing the NSDAP is not as simple, the view towards the NSDAP being as it is partially hidden, lightly distorted, unfocussed, by the mists of an unquestioned post-War narrative. And that
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As all around, certainly all around here in Europe, the world blossoms and blooms into life, as colour and variety and vitality abound, it's strange to remember that just a few short weeks ago everything was so barren, monochrome, desolate. Not least in context of the global architecture and design museum community: how hard we had to labour to achieve anything approaching what could justifiably be termed a 'list' of new architecture and design exhibitions. Similarly it's hard to imagine that
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In context of the 1923 Bauhaus exhibition in Weimar, that first wide-ranging presentation of the school, its work and its understandings of itself and the world in which it existed, the institute presented with the Haus am Horn by Georg Muche and its interior, furniture, fittings and accessories by the likes of, and amongst others, Erich Dieckmann, Alma Buscher, Otto Lindig, Benita Otte or Marcel Breuer, a synopsis of the prevailing understandings of and positions to domestic arrangements and
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"Everybody, except myself, have used, and admit to having used my photographs ... and often also without mentioning my name", lamented Lucia Moholy in 1956, "everyone – except myself – have derived advantages from using my photographs, either directly, or indirectly, in a number of ways, be it in cash or prestige, or both".1 The photographs in question being of and from the Weimar and Dessau Bauhauses, photos which played, and continue to play, a not unimportant role in mediating Bauhaus to a
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"For men who have to write a lot, and over prolonged periods, a desk at which they can work standing up is an indispensable piece of furniture for altering their posture and for maintaining their health", opined Journal der Moden in May 1786. An age when, famously, only men wrote. Yet advantageous and positive as standing to write was, prolonged standing could, as Journal der Moden notes, lead to tiredness. A solution was however at hand for all who preferred working at a standing height desk
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For reasons too well understood to need mention here, the last couple of summers largely passed by without design school end of year exhibitions, or at least not in the manner and with the public accessibility we all once enjoyed and cherished. And as an inevitable consequence, our Campustour came to a grinding halt. Summer 2022 sees the return of the universal end of term exhibition. But not of the Campustour. Not that we've lost our passion for randomly traversing Europe, consuming
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"...one only finds warmth of life and sincerity where human nature is allowed to flourish", opined the German designer Erich Dieckmann in 1931, "one shouldn't forget that in our apartments. Let's treat our contemporary homes to something humane. Something unelaborate, something provisional, with some leeway and space for things to grow as they wish over time."1 With the exhibition Chairs: Dieckmann! The Forgotten Bauhäusler Erich Dieckmann, the Kunststiftung des Landes Sachsen-Anhalt and
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According to the Roman scholar Marcus Terentius Varro February 7th marks the first day of spring. Which strikes us, as we're sure it does you, as a little early; however, there was reason in Varro's bold claim, for Varro further sets February 7th as the start of the year, and for all links February 7th with the rising of the west wind, a favourable, warming wind, whose arrival indicates the need to start cultivating your land and crops, specifically Varro advises, "these are things which
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Bauhaus Weimar's centenary may now be behind us, but there remains a lot of discussion, consideration and reflection ahead of us. Not least in context of the rapidly approaching Bauhaus Dessau centenary. By way of an accompaniment to those reflections, considerations and discussions, and of engendering a differing perspective on both the schools and the contexts in which they existed, a Radio smow playlist devoted to music of, from and associated with the Bauhauses. Radio smow: A Bauhaus
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Looking back from the safety of 2019 it can be all too easy to assume that Bauhaus was a popularly received and much celebrated institution. ❌ From its very earliest days, even before the first students had arrived in Weimar, the institution met with tenacious criticism and steadfast resistance; and arguably nowhere more so than in Weimar. With the exhibition Mathilde von Freytag-Loringhoven. Painter, Author, Animal Psychologist and Bauhaus Critic the Stadtmuseum Weimar introduce one of the
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More or less…… ….. Back in May 2019 the sheer number of new architecture and design exhibitions opening globally allowed us to produce two recommendations lists: one featuring exhibitions with a strong Bauhaus/inter-War Modernism focus, and one more general, less focussed. Spring forward five months and with the global museum community now fully awoken from their summer slumber we once again find ourselves with a cornucopia of new exhibitions that invites two lists. An invitation we would
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We doubt we will be able to visit the 2019 Summaery exhibition at Bauhaus University Weimar, as we suspect the town will be too full of visitors celebrating the centenary of Bauhaus Weimar. Or perhaps better put, full of confused visitors wondering where all the steel tube furniture is..... Wrong Bauhaus people. Consequently we attempted to extract as much as we could from Summaery 2018. Bauhaus University Weimar @ Summaery 2018 Bauhaus University Weimar Summaery 2018 Although the
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Although Bauhaus originally opened in Weimar, the Bauhaus most people understand as Bauhaus is Bauhaus Dessau. But can the students of the Bauhaus University Weimar reclaim "Bauhaus" for Weimar? The Bauhaus University Weimar's annual Summaery exhibition offered a chance to learn more..... Bauhaus University Weimar (Photo © Bauhaus-Universität Weimar, Foto: Nathalie Mohadjer) Bauhaus University Weimar In context of architecture and design the combination of "Bauhaus" with "Weimar" is not
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Summer traditionally sees a fall off in the number of new exhibitions opening, the 2017 drought is however especially hard, so much so that we can only find four recommendations. Either the global museum community assume we're all at the beach, and thus not interested, or expect the world to end in September and so don't see the point in new exhibitions. It is a little unclear. However, not only are we interested, but it takes a little more than the threat of an imminent apocalypse to keep us
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Five recommendations for new architecture and design exhibitions opening in December 2016, featuring shows in Copenhagen, Weimar, Nürnberg, London and Munich 5 New Design Exhibitions for December 2016 2016 has been an awful year. As in proper awful. Which my explain the unusually high number of expressionist-esque art exhibitions opening globally in December 2016: the bright colours and supportive warmth and encouragement such works tend to radiate being just what we all need after a tough
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The older we get the more important July becomes as it allows us to return to college to view design schools end of term exhibitions - a genuine highlight of our year. In addition July 2015 saw us celebrate two of the most important representatives of concrete construction, two completely contrasting representatives of concrete construction: Ulrich Muther und Le Corbusier. Rescue station on Binz Beach, Rügen, Germany by Ulrich Müther (completed 1968) Garderobe7 by Juliane Huhn as seen at
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On the evening of Thursday June 9th Bauhaus University Weimar formally opened the 2015 edition of their annual Summaery end of year exhibition; thus, and equally formally, launching our 2015 summer tour of student showcases. For all in or near Weimar this weekend, Summaery 2015 runs at the Bauhaus University Weimar, and at locations throughout the town, until 6pm on Sunday July 12th, full details can be found at www.uni-weimar.de/summaery, and here three design projects which particularly
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On the evening of Wednesday June 24th the winners of the 2015 aed neuland young designer competition were announced in a ceremony in Stuttgart. Organised by the design/architecture/engineering association aed Stuttgart, neuland is a biennial international competition open to students or recent graduates under the age of 28 and according to the organisers the 2015 competition attracted some 330 entries across the five categories. An exhibition featuring all 23 nominated and prize winning
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Thanks to a unnecessarily long journey through Sachsen-Anhalt in an unnecessarily warm bus, July 2014 will remain indelibly scorched in our collective memory. On a professional note, July 2014 also saw the exhibitions Unter Zwischen im Ampelhaus, Oranienbaum and Summer Break VA / Neue Arbeiten at Direktorenhaus Berlin, and of course the flood of student exhibitions that arise every summer.
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On the evening of Thursday July 10th the annual Bauhaus University Weimar "Summaery" student showcase exhibition opened for its 2014 edition. In terms of product design, and without meaning to be disingenuous, it wasn't the strongest Summaery we've ever been to. There were however a few projects that allowed us to leave without the feeling of having completely wasted our train fares. And so, and in no particular order..... WOob by Lisa Kästner (Realised in context of the class: MACHEN? -
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Herewith we inform the directors of the Hochschule für bildende Kunst that the Provisional Republican Government has approved the request to rename the unified Hochschule für bildende Kunst and Kunstgewerbeschule as "Staatliches Bauhaus in Weimar"1 With this succinct letter from the Office of the Hofmarschallamt in Weimar on 12th April 1919, Bauhaus formally existed. A succinct letter that ended four long years of negotiation and planning, and which - arguably, and depending on your position -
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March 2013 was a month of travelling: Stuttgart, Chemnitz, Weimar, Dessau..... its amazing we found time to actually write anything.......
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In 2019 the Staatlichen Bauhaus Weimar celebrates the 100th anniversary of its founding. And so, in effect, we can all celebrate 100 years of European Modernism as an important, tangible, unignorable and ever challenging movement. As part of the build-up to the anniversary the three Bauhaus locations - Berlin, Dessau, Weimar - have combined forces to instigate the Triennale der Moderne A Triennale with a triangular concept: Every three years each of the three locations will host three days
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