X 021 Expressionist Architecture

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Expressionist architecture

Goetheanum by Rudolf Steiner in 1923Main article: Expressionist architecture

Expressionist architecture was an architectural movement that developed in NorthernEurope during the first decades of the 20th century in parallel with the expressionist visualand performing arts.

The style was characterised by an early-modernist adoption of novel materials, formalinnovation, and very unusual massing, sometimes inspired by natural biomorphic forms,sometimes by the new technical possibilities offered by the mass production of brick, steeland especially glass. Many expressionist architects fought in World War I and theirexperiences, combined with the political turmoil and social upheaval that followed theGerman Revolution of 1919, resulted in a utopian outlook and a romantic socialistagenda.[12] Economic conditions severely limited the number of built commissions between1914 and the mid 1920s,[13] resulting in many of the most important expressionist worksremaining as projects on paper, such as Bruno Taut's Alpine Architecture and HermannFinsterlin's Formspiels. Ephemeral exhibition buildings were numerous and highly significantduring this period. Scenography for theatre and films provided another outlet for theexpressionist imagination,[14] and provided supplemental incomes for designers attemptingto challenge conventions in a harsh economic climate.

Expressionist architecture was an architectural movement that developed in Europe duringthe first decades of the 20th century in parallel with the expressionist visual and performingarts.

The term "Expressionist architecture" initially described the activity of the German, Dutch,Austrian, Czech and Danish avant garde from 1910 until 1930. Subsequent redefinitionsextended the term backwards to 1905 and also widened it to encompass the rest of Europe.Today the meaning has broadened even further to refer to architecture of any date orlocation that exhibits some of the qualities of the original movement such as; distortion,fragmentation or the communication of violent or overstressed emotion.[1]

The style was characterised by an early-modernist adoption of novel materials, formalinnovation, and very unusual massing, sometimes inspired by natural biomorphic forms,sometimes by the new technical possibilities offered by the mass production of brick, steeland especially glass. Many expressionist architects fought in World War I and their

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experiences, combined with the political turmoil and social upheaval that followed theGerman Revolution of 1919, resulted in a utopian outlook and a romantic socialist agenda.[2]

Economic conditions severely limited the number of built commissions between 1914 andthe mid-1920s,[3] resulting in many of the most important expressionist works remaining asprojects on paper, such as Bruno Taut's Alpine Architecture and Hermann Finsterlin'sFormspiels. Ephemeral exhibition buildings were numerous and highly significant during thisperiod. Scenography for theatre and films provided another outlet for the expressionistimagination,[4] and provided supplemental incomes for designers attempting to challengeconventions in a harsh economic climate.

Important events in expressionist architecture include; the Werkbund Exhibition (1914) inCologne, the completion and theatrical running of the Grosses Schauspielhaus, Berlin in1919, the Glass Chain letters, and the activities of the Amsterdam School. The majorpermanent extant landmark of Expressionism is Erich Mendelsohn's Einstein Tower inPotsdam. By 1925 most of the leading architects of Expressionism such as; Bruno Taut, ErichMendelsohn, Walter Gropius, Mies van der Rohe and Hans Poelzig, along with otherExpressionists in the visual arts, had turned toward the Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity)movement, a more practical and matter-of-fact approach which rejected the emotionalagitation of expressionism. A few, notably Hans Scharoun, continued to work in anexpressionist idiom.[5]

In 1933, after the Nazi seizure of power in Germany, expressionist art was outlawed asDegenerate art.[5] Until the 1970s scholars[6] commonly played down the influence of theexpressionists on the later International style, but this has been re-evaluated in recentyears.

Einstein Tower in Potsdam-Berlin, 1919-22 (Erich Mendelsohn)

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Characteristics

Expressionist architecture was individualistic and in many ways eschewed aestheticdogma,[7] but it is still useful to develop some criteria which defines it. Though containing agreat variety and differentiation, many points can be found as recurring in works ofExpressionist architecture, and are evident in some degree in each of its works.

1. Distortion of form for an emotional effect.[8]

2. Subordination of realism to symbolic or stylistic expression of inner experience.3. An underlying effort at achieving the new, original, and visionary.4. Profusion of works on paper, and models, with discovery and representations of concepts

more important than pragmatic finished products.5. Often hybrid solutions, irreducible to a single concept.[9]

6. Themes of natural romantic phenomena, such as caves, mountains, lightning, crystal androck formations.[10] As such it is more mineral and elemental than florid and organic whichcharacterized its close contemporary art nouveau.

7. Utilises creative potential of artisan craftsmanship.8. Tendency more towards the gothic than the classical. Expressionist architecture also tends

more towards the romanesque and the rococo than the classical.9. Though a movement in Europe, expressionism is as eastern as western. It draws as much

from Moorish, Islamic, Egyptian, and Indian art and architecture as from Roman or Greek.[11]

10. Conception of architecture as a work of art.[9]

Context

Goetheanum in Dornach near Basel Switzerland, 1924-28 (Rudolf Steiner)

Political, economic and artistic shifts provided a context for the early manifestations ofexpressionist architecture; particularly in Germany, where the utopian qualities ofexpressionism found strong resonances with a leftist artistic community keen to provideanswers to a society in turmoil during and after the events of World War I.[12] The loss of thewar, the subsequent removal of Kaiser Wilhelm II, the depravations and the rise of socialdemocracy and the optimism of the Weimar republic created a reluctance amongstarchitects to pursue projects initiated before the war and provided the impetus to seek newsolutions. An influential body of the artistic community, including architects, sought a similarrevolution as had occurred in Russia. The costly and grandiose remodelling of the Grosses

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Schauspielhaus, was more reminiscent of the imperial past, than wartime budgeting andpost-war depression.[13]

Artistic movements that preceded expressionist architecture and continued with someoverlap were the arts and crafts movement and art nouveau or in Germany, jugendstil.Unity of designers with artisans, was a major preoccupation of the Arts and Craftsmovement which extended into expressionist architecture. The frequent topic of naturalismin art nouveau, which was also prevalent in romanticism, continued as well, but took a turnfor the more earthen than floral. The naturalist, Ernst Haeckel was known by Finsterlin[14]

and shared his source of inspiration in natural forms.

The Futurist and constructivist architectural movements, and the dada anti-art movementwere occurring concurrently to expressionism and often contained similar features. BrunoTaut's magazine, Frülicht included constructivist projects, including Vladimir TatlinsMonument to the Third International.[15] However, futurism and constructivism emphasizedmechination,[16] and urbanism[17] tendencies which were not to take hold in Germany untilthe Neue Sachlichkeit. Mendelsohn is an exception whose work bordered on futurism andconstructivism. A quality of dynamic energy and exuberance exists in both the sketches ofErich Mendelsohn and futurist Antonio Sant'Elia.[18] The Merzbau by Dada artist KurtSchwitters, with its angular, abstract form, held many expressionist characteristics.

Influence of individualists such as Frank Lloyd Wright and Antoni Gaudí also provided thesurrounding context for expressionist architecture. Portfolios of Wright were included in thelectures of Erich Mendelsohn and were well known to those in his circle.[19] Gaudí was alsoboth influenced and influencing what was happening in Berlin. In Barcelona, there was noabrupt break between the architecture of art nouveau and that of the early 20th century,where Jugendstil was opposed after 1900, and his work contains more of art nouveau thanthat of say Bruno Taut. The circle of der Ring, did know about Gaudí, as he was published inGermany, and Finsterlin was in correspondence.[20] Charles Rennie Mackintosh should alsobe mentioned in the larger context surrounding expressionist architecture. Hard to classifyas strictly arts and crafts or art nouveau, buildings such as the Hill House and his Ingramchairs have an expressionist tinge. His work was known on the continent, as it was exhibitedat the Vienna Secession exhibition in 1900.

Underlying ideas

Many writers contributed to the ideology of expressionist architecture. Sources ofphilosophy important to expressionist architects were works by Friedrich Nietzsche, SørenKierkegaard,[21] and Henri Bergson.[22] Bruno Taut's sketches were frequently noted withquotations from Nietzsche,[23] particularly Thus Spoke Zarathustra, whose protagonistembodied freedoms dear to the expressionists; freedom to reject the bourgeois world,freedom from history, and strength of spirit in individualist isolation.[23] Zarathustra'smountain retreat was an inspiration to Taut's Alpine Architecture.[24] Henri Van de Veldedrew a title page illustration for Nietzsche's Ecce Homo.[25] The author Franz Kafka in his TheMetamorphosis, with its shape shifting matched the material instability of expressionistarchitecture[26] Naturalists such as Charles Darwin, and Ernst Haeckel contributed anideology for the biomorphic form of architects such as Herman Finsterlin. Poet Paul

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Scheerbart worked directly with Bruno Taut and his circle, and contributed ideas based onhis poetry of glass architecture.

Emergent psychology from Sigmund Freud and Karl Jung was important to expressionism.The exploration of psychological effects of form and space[27] was undertaken by architectsin their buildings, projects and films. Bruno Taut noted the psychological possibilities ofscenographic design that, "Objects serve psychologically to mirror the actors' emotions andgestures."[27] The exploration of dreams and the unconscious, provided material for theformal investigations of Hermann Finsterlin.

1824, Caspar David Friedrich's Das Eismeer (The Sea of Ice)

1921, Walter Gropius's Monument to the March Dead

Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries philosophies of aesthetics had been developing,particularly through the work of Kant and Schopenhauer and notions of the sublime. Theexperience of the sublime was supposed to involve a self-forgetfulness where personal fearis replaced by a sense of well-being and security when confronted with an object exhibitingsuperior might. At the end of the nineteenth century the German Kunstwissenschaft, or the"science of art", arose, which was a movement to discern laws of aesthetic appreciation andarrive at a scientific approach to aesthetic experience. At the beginning of the twentiethcentury Neo-Kantian German philosopher and theorist of aesthetics Max Dessoir foundedthe Zeitschift für Ästhetik und allgemeine Kunstwissenschaft, which he edited for manyyears, and published the work Ästhetik und allgemeine Kunstwissenschaft in which heformulated five primary aesthetic forms: the beautiful, the sublime, the tragic, the ugly, andthe comic. Iain Boyd Whyte writes that whilst "the Expressionist visionaries did not keep

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copies of Kant under their drawing boards. There was, however, in the first decades of thiscentury [20th] a climate of ideas that was sympathetic to the aesthetic concerns and artisticproduction of romanticism.[28]

Artistic theories of Wassily Kandinsky, such as Concerning the Spiritual in Art, and Point andLine to Plane were centerpieces of expressionist thinking.[29]

Materials

Catholic parish church "Heilig-Kreuz" at Gelsenkirchen by Josef Franke, 1927–1929

A recurring concern of expressionist architects was the use of materials and how they mightbe poetically expressed. Often, the intention was to unify the materials in a building so as tomake it monolithic. The collaboration of Bruno Taut and the utopian poet Paul Scheerbartattempted to address the problems of German society by a doctrine of glass architecture.Such utopianism can be seen in the context of a revolutionary Germany where the tusslebetween nationalism and socialism had yet to resolve itself. Taut and Scheerbart imagined asociety that had freed itself by breaking from past forms and traditions, impelled by anarchitecture that flooded every building with multicolored light and represented a morepromising future.[30] They published texts on this subject and built the Glass Pavilion at the1914 Werkbund exhibition. Inscribed around the base of the dome were aphoristic sayingsabout the material, penned by Scheerbart.

"Coloured glass destroys hatred","Without a glass palace life is a burden","Glass brings us anew era, building in brick only does us harm"- Paul Scheerbart, inscriptions on the 1914Werkbund Glass Pavilion[15]

Another example of expressionist use of monolithic materials was by Erich Mendelsohn atthe Einstein Tower. Not to be missed was a pun on the towers namesake, Einstein, and anattempt to make the building out of one stone, Ein stein.[31] Though not cast in one pour ofconcrete (due to technical difficulties, brick and stucco were used partially) the effect of thebuilding is an expression of the fluidity of concrete before it is cast. 'Architecture of Steeland Concrete' was the title of an 1919 exhibition of Mendelsohn's sketches at Paul Cassirer'sgallery in Berlin.

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Brick was used in a similar fashion to express the inherent nature of the material. JosefFranke produced some characteristic expressionist churches in the Ruhrgebiet in the 1920s.Bruno Taut used brick as a way to show mass and repetition in his Berlin Housing Estate"Legien-Stadt". In the same way as their Arts and Crafts movement predecessors, toexpressionist architects, populism, naturalism, and according to Pehnt "Moral andsometimes even irrational arguments were adduced in favor of building in brick".[32] With itscolor and pointillist like visual increment, brick became to expressionism what stucco laterbecame to the international style.

Theatres and films

An example of expressionist architecture in the film set for The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.

Europe witnessed a boom in theatrical production in the early twentieth century. In 1896there were 302 permanent theatres in Europe, by 1926 there were 2,499.[13] Cinemawitnessed a comparable increase in its use and popularity and a resulting increase in thenumber of picture houses. It was also able to provide a temporary reality for innovativearchitectural ideas.[27]

Many architects designed theatres for performances on the stage and film sets forexpressionist films. These were defining moments for the movement, and with its interest intheatres and films, the performing arts held a significant place in expressionist architecture.Like film, and theatre, expressionist architecture created an unusual and exotic environmentto surround the visitor.

Built examples of expressionist theatres include Henry van de Velde's construction of themodel theatre for the 1914 Werkbund Exhibition, and Hans Poelzig's grand remodelling ofthe Grosses Schauspielhaus. The enormous capacity of the Grosses Schauspielhaus enabledlow ticket prices, and the creation of a 'peoples theatre'.[13] Not only were expressionistarchitects building stages, Bruno Taut wrote a play intended for the theatre,Weltbaumeister.[4]

Expressionist architects were both involved in film and inspired by it. Hans Poelzig strove tomake films based on legends or fairy tales.[33] Poelzig designed scenographic sets for PaulWegener's 1920 film, Der Golem. Space in Der Golem was a three dimensional village, alifelike rendering of the Jewish ghetto of Prague. This contrasts with the setting of the

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Cabinet of Doctor Caligari, which was painted on canvas backdrops.[34] Perhaps the latterwas able to achieve more stylistic freedom, but Poelzig in Der Golem was able to create awhole village that "spoke with a Jewish accent."[33]

Herman Finsterlin approached Fritz Lang with an idea for a film.[4] Fritz Lang's filmMetropolis demonstrates a visually progressive 'Futurist' society dealing with relevant issuesof 1920s Germany in relation to labour and society. Bruno Taut designed an unbuilt theatrefor reclining cinema-goers.[35] Bruno Taut also proposed a film as an anthology for the GlassChain, entitled Die Galoschen des Glücks(The Galoshes of Fortune) with a name borrowedfrom Hans Christian Andersen. On the film, Taut noted, "an expressionism of the mostsubtle kind will bring surroundings, props, and action into harmony with one another."[36] Itfeatured architectural fantasias suited to each member of the Chain.[4] Ultimatelyunproduced, it reveals the aspiration that the new medium, film, invoked.

Abstraction

The tendency towards abstraction in art corresponded with abstraction in architecture.Publication of Concerning the Spiritual in Art in 1912 by Wassily Kandinsky, his first advocacyof abstraction while still involved in the Blau Reiter phaze, marks a beginning of abstractionin expressionism and abstraction in expressionist architecture.[29] The conception of theEinstein Tower by Erich Mendelson was not far behind Kandinsky, in advancing abstractionin architecture. By the publication of Kandinsky's Point and Line to Plane in 1926 a rigorousand more geometric form of abstraction emerged, and Kandinsky's work took on clearer anddrafted lines. The trends in architecture are not dissimilar, as the Bauhaus was gainingattention and expressionist architecture was giving way to the geometric abstractions ofmodern architecture.

Brick Expressionismsee main article Brick Expressionism

The term Brick Expressionism (German: Backsteinexpressionismus) describes a specificvariant of expressionism that uses bricks, tiles or clinker bricks as the main visible buildingmaterial. Buildings in the style were erected mostly in the 1920s. The style's regional centreswere the larger cities of Northern Germany and the Ruhr area, but the Amsterdam Schoolbelongs to the same category.

Amsterdam's 1912 cooperative-commercial Scheepvaarthuis (Shipping House), is consideredthe starting point and prototype for Amsterdam School work: brick construction withcomplicated masonry, traditional massing, and the integration of an elaborate scheme ofbuilding elements (decorative masonry, art glass, wrought-iron work, and exterior figurativesculpture) that embodies and expresses the identity of the building. The School flourisheduntil about 1925.

The great international fame of German Expressionism is not related to German BrickExpressionist architects, but to German Expressionist painters like Ernst Ludwig Kirchner,

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Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, Emil Nolde, Max Beckmann, Vasily Kandinsky and his German friendsin Munich around 1908, and so on.

LegacyThis section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.(November 2008)

Douglas Cardinal's National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C..

The legacy of expressionist architecture extended to later movements in the twentiethcentury. It had an influence on its immediate successor, modern architecture, as well as ArtDeco. The new objectivity (Neue Sachlichkeit) art movement arose in direct opposition toexpressionism. Expressionistic architecture today is an evident influence indeconstructivism, the work of Santiago Calatrava, and the organic movement ofblobitecture.

Many of the founders and significant players in expressionist architecture were alsoimportant in modern architecture. Examples are Bruno Taut, Hans Scharoun, WalterGropius, and Mies Van der Rohe. By 1927 Gropius, Taut, Scharoun and Mies were allbuilding in the international style and participated in the Weissenhof Estate. Gropius andMies are better known for their modernist work, but Gropius' Monument to the MarchDead, and Mies' Friedrichstrasse office building projects are basic works of expressionistarchitecture. Le Corbusier started his career in modern architecture but took a turn for amore expressionist manner later in life.

Art Deco

First identified at the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernesin 1925, art deco shares some characteristics of expressionism and is likely to have beeninfluenced directly by the Expressionist movement - particularly the activities of the WeimarBauhaus - and more generally with the factors and politics that influenced both movementsat the time, such as socialism and mechanisation. In common with art nouveau and

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expressionism they are interested in decorative effects that break with the past and reflect anew modernity. The bold use of zigzag and stepped forms, and sweeping curves andchevron patterns. New materials are employed in new ways such as glass, aluminium andstainless steel. Later examples of Art Deco, particularly in New York can be seen as aTransatlantic equivalent of European expressionism.

Neo Expressionism

Torres de Satélite seen from the Anillo Periférico

The influential architectural critic and historian, Sigfried Giedion in his book Space, Time andArchitecture (1941) dismissed Expressionist architecture as a side show in the developmentof functionalism. In the middle of the twentieth century, in the 50s and 60s, many architectsbegan designing in a manner reminiscent of expressionist architecture. In this post warperiod, a variant of expressionism brutalism had an honest approach to materials, that in itsunadorned use of concrete, was similar to the use of brick by the Amsterdam School. Thedesigns of Le Corbusier took a turn for the expressionist in his brutalist phase, but more soin his Notre Dame du Haut. In Mexico, in 1953, German émigré Mathias Goeritz, publishedthe "Arquitectura Emocional" (Emotional architecture) manifesto where he declared that"architecture's principal function is emotion." [37] Modern Mexican architect Luis Barragánadopted the term that influenced his work. The two of them collaborated in the projectTorres de Satélite (1957–58) guided by Goeritz's principles of Arquitectura Emocional.Another mid-century modern architect to evoke expressionism was Eero Saarinen. A similaraesthetic can be found in later buildings such as Eero Saarinen's 1962 TWA Terminal at JFKInternational Airport. His TWA Terminal at JFK International Airport has an organic form, asclose to Herman Finsterlin's Formspiels as any other, save Jørn Utzon's Sydney Opera House.It was only in the 1970s that expressionism in architecture came to be re-evaluated in amore positive light. More recently[when?] still, the aesthetics and tactility of expressionistarchitecture have found echo in the works of Enric Miralles, most notability his ScottishParliament building, deconstructivist architects such as Zaha Hadid and Daniel Libeskind, aswell as Canadian Aboriginal architect Douglas Cardinal.[38][

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Timeline

1900

Reactions to Art Nouveau impelled partly by moral yearnings for a sterner and moreunadorned style and in part by rationalist ideas requiring practical justification forformal effects. Art Nouveau had however, opened up a language of abstraction andpointed to lessons to be learned from nature.[40]

August 25, 1900, death of Friedrich Nietzsche

1905

Formation of the Dresden Die Brücke expressionist art movement.

1907

The poet Paul Scheerbart independently offers a Science fiction image of Utopianfuture.

1908

Adolf Loos publishes his essay/manifesto "Ornament and Crime" which rejectsornamentation in favour of abstraction.

1909

The New Munich Artist's Association, Neue Künstlervereinigung München isestablished by Wassily Kandinsky and others in Munich.

1910

Publication in Berlin of the journals, Der Sturm by Herwarth Walden and Die Aktionby Franz Pfemfert as counterculture mouthpieces against the Deutscher Werkbund.

1911

Hans Poelzig sets up practice in Breslau. Designs a water tower for Posen (now:Poznań, Poland), described by Kenneth Frampton as a certain Die Stadtkrone image,

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and an office building which led to the architectural format of Erich Mendelsohn'slater Berliner "Mosse-Haus" in 1921.[40]

Wassily Kandinsky resigns chairmanship of the Neue Künstlervereinigung München. Walter Gropius and Adolf Meyer (architect) build the Fagus Factory, Alfeld an der

Leine. Der Blaue Reiter forms and has first exhibits in Munich, and Berlin

1912

Hans Poelzig designs a chemical plant in Lubań with strongly expressively articulatedbrick massing.

Wassily Kandinsky publishes Über das Geistige in der Kunst, ("Concerning theSpiritual in Art")

Work of the Amsterdam School starts with the cooperative-commercialScheepvaarthuis (Shipping House), designed by Johan van der Mey

1913

Michel de Klerk starts work on the first of three apartment buildings atSpaarndammerplantsoen, Amsterdam the last to be completed in 1921.

Rudolf Steiner commences work on the first Goetheanum. Work is completed in1919.

Peder Vilhelm Jensen-Klint wins design competition for Grundtvig's Church inCopenhagen, Denmark.

1914

Front page of 'Die Aktion' from 1914 with illustration by Egon Schiele

Paul Scheerbart publishes Glasarchitecktur

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Cologne Werkbund exhibition demonstrates ideological split between:

1. Normative form (Typisierung) - Behrens, Gropius, and,2. Will to form (Kunstwollen) - Taut, van de Velde

1915

Death of Paul Scheerbart. Franz Kafka publishes The Metamorphosis

1917

Michel de Klerk starts building the Het Schip the third and most accomplishedapartment buildings at Spaarndammerplantsoen, for the Eigen Haard developmentcompany in Amesterdam [1]. Work is completed in 1921.

Bruno Taut publishes Alpine architecture.

1918

Adolf Behne expands the socio-cultural implications Scheerbarts writings aboutglass.

Armistice – Republican revolution in Germany. Social Democrats form Workers andSoldiers Councils. General strikes.

Free expression of the Amsterdam School elucidated in the Wendingen (Changes)magazine.

November - Arbeitsrat für Kunst (Worker's Council for the Arts), founded by BrunoTaut and Adolf Behne. They model themselves consciously on the Soviets and attacha leftist programme to their Utopian and Expressionist activities. They demand; 1. Aspiritual revolution to accompany the political one. 2. Architects to form‘Corporations’ bound by ‘mutual aid’.

November - Novembergruppe formed only to merge with Arbeitsrat für Kunst thefollowing month. It proclaims; 1. Creation of collective art works. 2. Mass housing. 3.The destruction of artistically valueless monuments (This was a common reaction ofthe Avant Garde against the elitist militarism that was perceived as the cause ofWorld War I).

December - Arbeitsrat für Kunst declares its basic aims in Bruno TautsArchiteckturprogramm. It calls for a new 'total work of art', to be created with activeparticipation of the people.

Bruno Taut publishes Die Stadtkrone.

1919

Spring manifesto of Arbeitsrat für Kunst is published. Art for the masses. Alliance ofthe arts under the wing of architecture. 50 artists, architects and patrons join lead byBruno Taut, Walter Gropius and Adolf Behne.

April - Erich Mendelsohn, Hannes Meyer, Bernard Hoetger, Max Taut and OttoBartning stage exhibition called 'An Exhibition of Unknown Architects'. Walter

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Gropius writes the introduction, now considered to be a first draft for the Bauhausprogramme published later in the month. Called for a ‘Cathedral of the Future’, tounify the creative energy of society as in the Middle Ages.

Bauhaus established and begins expressionist phase, to last until 1923. Adolf Behne publishes Ja! Stimmen des Arbeitsrates für Kunst in Berlin (Yes! Voices

from the art Soviet in Berlin). Spartacist revolt ends the overt activities of Arbeitsrat für Kunst. The group starts the

first Utopian letter of the Glass Chain by Bruno Taut. They are joined by previouslyperipheral architects; Hans Luckhardt, Wassili Luckhardt and Hans Scharoun. Theletters demand; 1. Return to medieval integration of the building team. 2. Irregularform. 3. Facetted form. 4. Glass monuments.

Opening of the Grosses Schauspielhaus by Hans Poelzig in Berlin. Hangingpendentive forms create a ‘luminous dissolution of form and space’.

Bruno Taut launches the magazine Frühlicht (Early Light). Bruno Taut and Hans Scharoun stress the creative importance of the Freudian

unconscious. Hans Poelzig is made chairman of the Deutscher Werkbund. Design work starts on Piet Kramers De Dageraad. Construction is completed in 1923.

Mendelsohn see it as more structural than the work of Hendrikus Wijdeveld.

1920

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe's Friedrichstraße Skyscraper Project, Berlin-Mitte, 1921

February 26, the film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari premiered at the Marmorhaus inBerlin.

Hans Poelzig declares affinity with the Glass Chain. He designs sets for The Golem. Solidarity of the Glass Chain is broken. Final letter written by Hermann Finsterlin.

Hans Luckhardt recognises the incompatibility of free unconscious form andrationalist prefabrication and moves to Rationalism.

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Taut maintains his Scheerbartian views. He publishes ‘Die Auflösung der Städt' (Thedissolution of the city) in line with Kropotkinian anarchist socialist tendencies. Incommon with the Soviets, it recommends the breakup of cities and a return to theland. He models agrarian communities and temples in the Alps. There would be 3separate residential communities. 1. The enlightened. 2. Artists. 3. Children. Thisauthoritarianism is noted in Frampton as although socialist in intent, paradoxicallycontaining the seeds of the later fascism.

1921

Taut is made city architect of Magdeburg and fails to realise a municipal exhibitionhall as the harsh economic realities of the Weimar republic become apparent andprospects of building a ‘glass paradise’ dwindle.

Walter Gropius designs the Monument to the March Dead[2] in Weimar. It iscompleted in 1922 and inspires the workers' gong in the 1927 film Metropolis byFritz Lang.

Frülicht loses its impetus. Erich Mendelsohn visits works of the Dutch Wendingen group and tours the

Netherlands. He meets the rationalists JJP Oud and W M Dudek. He recognises theconflict of visionary and objective approaches to design.

Erich Mendelsohn's Mossehaus opens. Construction is complete on the EinsteinTower. It combines the sculptural forms of Van de Weldes Werkbund Exhibitiontheatre with the profile of Taut's Glashaus and the formal affinity to vernacularDutch architecture of Eibink and Snellebrand and Hendrikus Wijdeveld. Einsteinhimself visits and declares it ‘organic’.

Mendelsohn designs a hat factory in Luckenwalde. It shows influences of the Dutchexpressionist De Klerk, setting dramatic tall pitched industrial forms againsthorizontal administrative elements. This approach is echoed in his Leningrad textilemill of 1925 and anticipates the banding in his department stores in Breslau,Stuttgart, Chemnitz and Berlin from 1927 and 1931.

Hugo Häring and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe submit a competition entry for aFriedrichstrasse office building. It reveals an organic approach to structure and isfully made of glass.

1922

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe publishes a glass skyscraper project in the last issue ofFrülicht.

The film Nosferatu by F.W. Murnau is released.

1923

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Chilehaus by Fritz Höger in 1923

Bauhaus expressionist phase ends. Standard arguments for the reasons for this are 1.Expressionism was difficult to build. 2. Rampant inflation in Germany changed theclimate of opinion to a more sober one. Jencks postulates that the standardarguments are too simplistic and instead argues that 1. Expressionism had becomeassociated with extreme utopianism which in turn had been discredited by violenceand bloodshed. Or 2. Architects had become convinced that the new (rationalist)style was equally expressive and more adequately captured the Zeitgeist. There is nolarge disagreements or public pronouncements to precipitate this change indirection. The only outwardly visible reaction was the forced resignation of the headof the basic Bauhaus course, Johannes Itten, to be replaced with the, thenconstructivist, László Moholy-Nagy.

Chilehaus in Hamburg by Fritz Höger. Walter Gropius abandons expressionism and moves to rationalism. Bruno and Max Taut begin work on government funded low cost housing projects. Berlin secession exhibition. Mies van der Rohe and Hans and Wassili Luckhardt

demonstrate a more functional and objective approach. Rudolf Steiner designs second Goetheanum after first was destroyed by fire in 1922.

Work commences 1924 and is completed in 1928. Michel de Klerk dies and the style of the Amsterdam School effectively dies with him.

1924

Germany adopts the Dawes plan. Architects more inclined to produce low-costhousing than pursue utopian ideas about glass.

Hugo Häring designs a farm complex. It uses expressive pitched roofs contrastedwith bulky tectonic elements and rounded corners.

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Hugo Häring designs Prinz Albrecht Garten, residential project. Whilst demonstratingovert expressionism he is preoccupied with deeper inquiries into the inner source ofform.

Foundation of Zehnerring group. June 3, Death of Franz Kafka. Hermann Finsterlin initiates a series of correspondence with Antoni Gaudí.[41]

1925

Hans Poelzig abandons expressionism and returns to crypto-classicism. Zehnerring group becomes Der Ring. Hugo Häring is appointed secretary. Max Brod publishes Franz Kafka's The Trial Eugen Schmohl completes the Borsig-Tower in Berlin-Tegel

Buildings completed in 1925

Borsig-Tower in Berlin-Tegel

1926

Founding of the architectural collective Der Ring largely turns its back onexpressionism and towards a more functionalist agenda.

Wassily Kandinsky publishes Point and Line to Plane. Max Brod publishes Franz Kafka's The Castle

1927

Anzeiger-Hochhaus, Hanover by Fritz Höger Release of Fritz Lang's Metropolis. Weissenhof Estate is built in Stuttgart. Expressionist architects, Taut, Poelzig,

Scharoun, build in international style.

Buildings completed in 1927

Anzeiger-Hochhaus Hannover by Fritz Höger, 1927

18

1928

Congrès International d'Architecture Moderne (CIAM) convenes in Switzerland. HugoHäring fails to move consensus away from Le Corbusiers call for rationalism towardsan organic approach. Finally the Scheerbartian vision is eclipsed as the non-normative ‘place’ orientated approach is cast aside.

The Großmarkthalle at Frankfurt (by Martin Elsaesser) is completed. Chapel of the Cemetery of Glienicke/Nordbahn (Germany) is completed. Architect:

Paul Poser

Chapel of Cemetery in Glienicke/Nordbahn

1930

1931

Completion of 'The house of Atlantis' in Böttcherstraße (Bremen).

Böttcherstraße

1938

After Nazi seizure of power, expressionist art was outlawed as degenerate art.

18

1928



Paul Poser


1930

1931


Böttcherstraße

1938


18

1928



Paul Poser


1930

1931


Böttcherstraße

1938


19

1937

Design of Hallgrímskirkja in Reykjavík, Iceland by Guðjón Samúelsson.

1940

The Berlin Philharmonic concert hall is destroyed in 1944 during World War II.

1950

Le Corbusier constructs Notre Dame du Haut signaling his postmodern return to anarchitectural expressionism of form. He also constructs the Unité d'Habitation, whichemphasizes the architectural expression of materials. The brutalist use of béton brut(reinforced concrete) recalls the expressionist use of glass, brick, and steel.

1960

Expressionism reborn without the political context as Fantastic architecture. Rebuilding of the Berlin Philharmonic in 1963 by Hans Scharoun. Church of The Highway by Giovanni Michelucci is inaugurated in Italy.

Expressionist architects of the 1920s

Adolf Behne Hermann Finsterlin Antoni Gaudí Walter Gropius - early period Hugo Häring Fritz Höger Michel de Klerk Piet Kramer Carl Krayl Erich Mendelsohn Hans Poelzig Hans Scharoun Rudolf Steiner Bruno Taut

Documents

X 021 Expressionist Architecture