Bauhaus

The Bauhaus was the greatest instrumental modernist art school whose perspective was educating, and comprehending art's connection to society and technology. Bauhaus was given the name by Gropius, which means building a house and it also stands for “an eagerness to experiment, openness, creativity, a close link to industrial practice and inter-nationality.” Gropius invented a craft-based syllabus that would turn out artisans and designers skilled to manufacture practical and attractive things relevant to this recent living system. The Bauhaus amalgamated components of both fine arts and design tuition. Inventiveness and production were drifting apart, and the Bauhaus aspired to combine them one more time, renovating design for day-to-day life.

Bauhaus building in Dessau, Germany (1919-1925) by Walter Gropius

Bauhaus Building

At the base it evolves into a magnificent sequence of altering aspects, above each component is completely split from the following and at the top the design seems firmly united. The building is composed of an asphalt tiled roof, steel framework, and fortified concrete bricks to lessen the noise and safeguard against the weather (Borteh, 2017). Gropius demonstrated the school's functionalist perspective by maintaining an elegance that presented how glamour and feasibility could be amalgamated. Balconies and large windows in the dormitory rooms were also planned out. The Bauhaus building has studios, auditoriums, classrooms and housing in an asymmetrical pinwheel layout.

Light is brought into the studios through the glass curtain walls and industrial sash.

Club Chair (Model B3) (The Wassily Chair) (1925) by  Marcel Breuer

The Wassily Chair

"The structural design seemed like Breuer's bicycle handlebars that were crafted from the seamless material" (Borteh, 2017). The elegant design and progressive use of materials in the Club Chair are particular of the pioneering developments in design that made the Bauhaus well known. It is both lightweight and the chair is effortlessly mass produced. Its components are assembled with precision that makes its layout intelligible straight away. Breuer assembled the chair applying recently sophisticated seamless-steel bent tubing that could persist physical pressure without hesitation (Borteh, 2017). Breuer stated The Wassily Chair as his "most extreme work . . . the least artistic, the most logical, the least 'cozy' and the most mechanical."

Model No. MT 49 (1927) by Marianne Brandt

Model No. MT 49

This design is a knowledge of basic geometric forms. This tea-pot is a presentation of how simple forms can be amalgamated to manufacture lovely items for daily use. The basic sophistication of Brandt's tea infuser epitomizes the practicality of Bauhaus design and it can be replicated without any difficulty. The semi-circle handle and silver cylindrical spout are ingenious in design (Borteh, 2017).

Tel Aviv’s White City

The central White City, Tel Aviv is where one finds the best-preserved collections of Bauhaus and International Style architecture.

Bruno House, 3 Strauss Street by Ze'ev Haller, 1933

Bruno House

Its design has Modernist characteristics, such as the special importance on the balconies on the Strauss Street facade, uniquely designed in a curving line continuously.

Dr Leon Pines House, 79–81 Yehuda Halevi Street by Yitzhak Rapoport, 1938

Dr Leon Pines House

This symmetrical building is meticulously designed. It has two entrances. Its architectural importance is due to tremendous observation to details.

Ehrlich House, 79 Herzl Street by Ze'ev Haller, 1933

Ehrlich House

Haller gave special importance to the building's horizontal dimension through the grey stripes that link the windows together. The vertical thermometer window of the stairwell was made more noticeable. The top-floor balcony and the roof pergola puts a prominent emphasize on the corner (Howarth, 2016).

References

Research:

"Bauhaus Movement Overview and Analysis". [Internet]. 2017. TheArtStory.org. Content compiled and written by Larissa Borteh. Edited and published by The Art Story Contributors. Available from: <http://www.theartstory.org/movement-bauhaus.htm> [Accessed 26 March 2017]

Dan Howarth. “10 of Tel Aviv's best examples of Bauhaus residential architecture”. [Online]. 24th August 2016. Dezeen. < https://www.dezeen.com/2016/08/24/10-tel-aviv-best-examples-bauhaus-residential-architecture/> [Accessed 26 March 2017]

Publication excerpt from The Museum of Modern Art, MoMA Highlights, New York: The Museum of Modern Art, revised 2004, originally published 1999, p. 128

Lee F. Mindel. “Why Anyone Who Loves Design Should Visit Bauhaus Dessau”.[Online]. 20 November 2015. Architectural Digest. < http://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/bauhaus-dessau-campus-architecture> [Accessed 26 March 2017]

Images:

Publication excerpt from The Museum of Modern Art, MoMA Highlights, New York: The Museum of Modern Art, revised 2004, originally published 1999, p. 128

Lee F. Mindel. “Why Anyone Who Loves Design Should Visit Bauhaus Dessau”.[Online]. 20 November 2015. Architectural Digest. < http://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/bauhaus-dessau-campus-architecture> [Accessed 26 March 2017]

Marcus Fairs. “The $361,000 teapot: Marianne Brandt breaks Bauhaus auction record”. [Online]. 21 December 2007. Dezeen. < https://www.dezeen.com/2007/12/21/the-361000-teapot-marianne-brandt-breaks-bauhaus-auction-record/> [Accessed 26 March 2017]

Dan Howarth. “10 of Tel Aviv's best examples of Bauhaus residential architecture”. [Online]. 24th August 2016. Dezeen. < https://www.dezeen.com/2016/08/24/10-tel-aviv-best-examples-bauhaus-residential-architecture/> [Accessed 26 March 2017]

Constructivism

Constructivism was the final and most important contemporary Russian avant-garde art movement which began two years before Suprematism. The Constructivists believed that art should be useful, not just hung on a wall. The leaders of Constructivism were Vladimir Tatlin, El Lissitzky, Naum Gabo and Aleksander Rodchenko. Constructivists artists adopted ideas from Cubism, Suprematism and Futurism, but was completely a fresh perspective to making articles and substituting it with 'construction.' Constructivism required a cautious technical evaluation of progressive materials. The goal of most Constructivists was to take art to the people, in the factory and on the collective farms. Others  continuously persisted on the appreciation of abstract, analytical work and the importance of art.

Constructivists suggested to substitute art's customary related with composition with the center of attention on construction. Articles were invented not to demonstrate beauty or the artist's perspective but to carry out basic analysis of the materials and forms of art, one which might lead to the design of functional objects. The shape an artist’s work would require, would be domineered by its substances. Constructivists were to be builders of a recent community.

Design for the Monument to the Third International (1919-1920) by Vladimir Tatlin

Model of Tatlin's Tower in the courtyard of the Royal Academy, London

Monument to the Third International, frequently known just as Tatlin's Tower, is the artist's most prominent work. The Tower, which was never accomplished completely, was meant to act as a fully functional conference space, executive headquarters, communications, media and propaganda center for the Communist Third International. The model of this amazing structure, looks like a cross between the Eiffel Tower, the Leaning Tower of Pisa and a steel spiral frame or helix. The tower was to include three glass rotating building-size units, a cube, cylinder and cone that rotate once per year, month, and day, respectively. Tatlin also planned to mount a huge projector inside the cylinder that would beam messages into the sky, with the clouds serving as projector screens. For Tatlin, steel and glass were the essential materials of modern construction. They symbolized industry, technology and the machine age, and the continous movement of the geometrically shaped units embodied the dynamism of modernity.

Constructivist Head No.1 by Naum Gabo (1915)

Constructivist Head No.1

Gabo’s sculptures are called kinetic art because they suggest motion and the passage of time. The interplay of curves in Gabo’s sculpture creates a sense of dynamic motion and energy. Gabo’s loyalty to modernism, is demonstrated in his selection of materials, which frequently lent his shapes the quality of a machine.

His Constructivist Head No.1 is a female bust created from intermeshing planes and negative area. The woman’s curving shoulders and long, smooth neck produce a feeling of vitality as they were involved directly with each other and the areas they cut out. Gabo constructed the head from plywood. He was eventually further noteworthy outside Russia, bringing Constructivist objectives to Germany, France, England, and ultimately the United States.

Constructivist structures from the 1920s still spot the concurrent Russian landscape, regretful reminders of a visualized future that never came to progress.

The movement's genuine bequest, comprises not so much in the particulars of what was literally constructed and designed during the 1920s, but in the world of dreams: the manifestos, theories, blueprints and plans they left behind, unrealised.

CMA CGM Headquarters in Marseille, France designed by Zaha Hadid (2005-2010)

CMA CGM Headquarters

Inspired by Constructivism, Zaha Hadid designed the building sloping upward in a metallic bending curve that steadily raises and rises toward the sky into the striking upright geometry of its dramatically changing shapes.

References

Research:

Jesse Bryant Wilder (2007). Art History For Dummies. New Jersey- John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Content compiled and written by Tracee Ng. Edited and published by The Art Story Contributors."Constructivism Movement Overview and Analysis". [Online]. 2017. TheArtStory.org . Available at: http://www.theartstory.org/movement-constructivism.htm [Accessed 12 March 2017].

Creative Bloq Staff (11 October 2013). "The easy guide to design movements: Constructivism". Creative Bloq. [online] Creativebloq.com. Available at: http://www.creativebloq.com/graphic-design/easy-guide-design-movements-constructivism-10134843 [Accessed 12 March 2017].

Zaha-hadid.com . "CMA CGM Headquarters". Zaha Hadid Architects. [online] Available at: http://www.zaha-hadid.com/architecture/cma-cgm-headquarters/ [Accessed 12 March 2017].

Images:

TobyJ (27 February 2012). "Model of Tatlin's Tower in the courtyard of the Royal Academy, London.". Wikipedia.[online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tatlin%27s_Tower#/media/File:Model_of_Tatlin_Tower,_Royal_Academy,_London,_27_Feb_2012.jpg [Accessed 12 March 2017].

Serena Philomela. "Constructivist Head No.1". flickr.[online] Available at: https://www.flickr.com/photos/serenaphilomela/5002717/sizes/m/ [Accessed 12 March 2017].

Zaha-hadid.com . "CMA CGM Headquarters". Zaha Hadid Architects. [online] Available at: http://www.zaha-hadid.com/architecture/cma-cgm-headquarters/ [Accessed 12 March 2017].

Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau was invented by Henry Van de Velde and Victor Horta, which was originally called le style Belge. This style is a decorative-arts, architecture and graphic-arts, that spread across Europe rapidly. Art Nouveau was intended to renovating the design, striving to breakout the extensive historical styles that had previously been popular. The designers developed classic designs such as integrated  graceful arabesques, geometric and natural forms, undulating, organic lines, twisting tendrils and flowers, and also voluptuous female forms. This style involves no symmetry.

Artists always took their designs from nature and then stylized them. This style was generally portrayed with colours such as subdued browns, greens, blues and yellows. The artists strived to raise the status of the decorative arts so much so that they used the movement’s guiding principle, “Decorative art should be everywhere”.  Art Nouveau was often most conspicuous at international expositions during its climax. The style was dominant in time of the decorative arts and architecture exhibition.

The most prominent people in Art Nouveau were:

Henry Van de Valde

Main building of Bauhaus University (1904)

Victor Horta

Tassel House Stairway (1894)

Hector Guimard

Entrances to Paris Subway Stations (1900)

Émile Gallé

Cameo glass vase (1890-1900)

Louis Comfort Tiffany

Pastoral window at Second Presbyterian Church, Chicago, Illinois (1917)

Model #342, “Wisteria” Lamp (ca. 1901-05) by Clara Driscoll for Tiffany Studios, New York

Wisteria Lamp

Some of the most prominent Art Nouveau articles are the table lamps manufactured by Louis Comfort Tiffany's firm. One of the most valuable is model #342 which is also known as “Wisteria”. The bronze base is similar to the roots and lower trunk of a tree. The shade is of leaded glass that seem like the boughs of a wisteria. These suspend the flowering petals that seem to drip like drops of water  whose screen creates a warm soft glow. The asymmetry of the armature at the crown across the edge at the bottom of the shade adds to the naturalism of the design.

Lombard Bank branch in Tower Road, Sliema by Giuseppe Psaila (1914)  

The right side of the premises

The left side of the premises

The building with stunning Art Nouveau motifs and classical elements was given a new lease of life when Lombard Bank transformed it into a branch after it had been abandoned for a long period of time. No modern extension was done externally to the building. Only modern limited interventions were done to the interior.

The premises has decorative pilasters. It incorporates markings and sculpted leaves on its facade. The fence features a spiral like motif which is similar to vine tendrils. The windows also have these flowing and twisting lines. The premises isn’t symmetrical too.

Balluta Buildings in San Ġiljan, Malta by Giuseppe Psaila (1928)

The edifice

The first block of the edifice

Gate in the middle of the edifice

This edifice is one of the few remaining buildings constructed in the Art Nouveau style. The central facade of the building comprises of a colossal block of apartments set within three blocks. The words Balluta, Buildings and  AD MCMXXVIII embellish the architrave beneath central pediments of each perpendicular structure. Each of these structures is distinguished by an elongated upright opening headed with a floral decorated arch with a putto carved on the keystone. There is also decorated pilasters running vertically along the facade. The two upper levels windows are grouped in pairs and joined by floral decorated architrave and are framed by decorative surrounds. Those on the lower levels are further enhanced by a decorative balustraded wall. The gate and railings have fascinating ironwork with twisting tendrils.

References

Research:

Jesse Bryant Wilder (2007). Art History For Dummies. New Jersey- John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Justin Wolf and Peter Clericuzio. Art Nouveau Movement Overview and Analysis. The Art Story. [online]  Available at: http://www.theartstory.org/movement-art-nouveau.htm [Accessed 5 March 2017]

Justin Wolf and Peter Clericuzio. Art Nouveau Movement Overview and Analysis. The Art Story. [online] Available at: http://www.theartstory.org/movement-art-nouveau-artworks.htm#pnt_2 [Accessed 5 March 2017]

Malta: Sovrintendenza Tal- Patrimonju Kulturali (28 December 2012). National Inventory of the Cultural Property of the Maltese Islands- Balluta Buildings [pdf]. Available at: http://www.culturalheritage.gov.mt/filebank/inventory/01212.pdf [Accessed 5 March 2017]

NEW LEASE OF LIFE FOR ART NOUVEAU BUILDING. Malta Environment & Planning Authority. [online] Newsletter 35. Available at: https://www.mepa.org.mt/newslet35-article4?l=1 [Accessed 5 March 2017]

Images:

Justin Wolf and Peter Clericuzio. Art Nouveau Movement Overview and Analysis. The Art Story. [online]  Available at: http://www.theartstory.org/movement-art-nouveau.htm [Accessed 5 March 2017]

Sam Parker (18 October 2016). Victor Horta: Belgium's Greatest Art Nouveau Architect. [online] The Culture Trip. Available at: https://theculturetrip.com/europe/belgium/articles/victor-horta-belgiums-greatest-art-nouveau-architect/ [Accessed 5 March 2017]

Frances J. Folsom (4 June 2014). Art Nouveau Architect Henry van de Velde. [online] Dwell. Available at: https://www.dwell.com/article/art-nouveau-architect-henry-van-de-velde-e93e8c31 [Accessed 5 March 2017]

Sailko (11 March 2009). Cameo glass vase by Émile Gallé. [online] Wikipedia. Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89mile_Gall%C3%A9#/media/File:Gall%C3%A9,_nancy,_vaso_clematis,_1890-1900.JPG [Accessed 5 March 2017]

Prairieavenue (4 January 2012). Pastoral window at Second Presbyterian Church (Chicago, Illinois). [online] Wikipedia. Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Comfort_Tiffany#/media/File:Pastoral_Window.jpg [Accessed 5 March 2017]

All pictures of the Balluta Buildings in San Ġiljan, Malta by Giuseppe Psaila (1928) and Lombard Bank branch in Tower Road, Sliema by Giuseppe Psaila (1914), were taken by me on 5 March 2017.