THE SPIRIT OF BAUHAUS, at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris
from 19 October 2016 to 26 February 2017
You might think of Bauhaus as a style, or maybe a school of thought. But Bauhaus was an actual school: an institute of design that gave some of history’s most important designers a grounding in aesthetics that continues to influence the way our world looks and works. Called the Staatliches Bauhaus, the school existed in Germany from 1919 to 1933. It was based first in Weimar until 1925, then Dessau through 1932, and then Berlin in its final months. Suspected of publishing anti-Nazi propaganda and documents linking Bauhaus to the Communist party, the school was closed indefinitely in 1933 when the Nazis came to power.
While its instruction was deeply devoted to functionality, it was among the first to set out and prove that functional need not be boring. Founded in 1919 in Weimar, Germany by the prominent architect Walter Gropius, Bauhaus ended up as the most influential modernist art school of the 20th century. It was defined as a utopian craft guild combining industrial design, architecture, sculpture and painting into a single creative expression.
Long after it closed, Bauhaus had a major impact both in Europe and the United States. It was shaped by the 19th and early 20th centuries trends such as the Arts and Crafts movement, which had sought to level the distinction between fine and applied arts, and to reunite creativity and manufacturing. The school is also renowned for its faculty, which included artists Wassily Kandinsky, Josef Albers, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Paul Klee and Johannes Itten, architects Walter Gropius and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, and designer Marcel Breuer.
The Bauhaus school produced some of the most significant design pieces that have stood the test of time, influencing generations of designers. Here are a few of the most iconic and timeless of Bauhaus design.
Mies van der Rohe and Lilly Reich – The Barcelona Chair (1929)
Wilhelm Wagenfeld – The Bauhaus Lamp (1924)
Marcel Breuer – The Cesca Chair (1927)
Marianne Brandt – The Tea Infuser (1924)
Josef Albers – Nesting Tables
Opening on Wednesday October 19th, a large exhibition at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs will pay homage to this artistic movement by displaying original Bauhaus pieces and celebrating the wide-ranging fruits of the influential art and architecture school. No fewer than 900 works and objects from the creative phenomenon will be displayed…
Musée des Arts Décoratifs
107, rue de Rivoli (beside the Louvre)
closed Mondays
Juliet in Paris