Ideology of Modernism
MODERNISM
Question: To what extent did the ideology of Modernism reflect new sets of values in architecture and design in the period between 1919 and 1960? Answer this question with examination of works of 3 architects/designers of the time analyzing how Modernism was manifested in their works.
ANSWER
Bauhaus’ Walter Gropius said in Germany, 1919, “Today’s artist lives in an era of dissolution without guidance. He stands alone. The old forms are in ruins, the benumbed world is shaken up, the old human spirit is invalidated and in flux towards a new form. We float in space and cannot perceive the new order”. This statement epitomized a Germany suffering shocking economic deprivation from reparations imposed by The Treaty of Versailles 1918. Across Northern France, Germany and Belgium countryside and villages were devastated. Europe was bereft and in chaos. People desperately searched a new order to dispel the atrocities of WWI.
Gropius’ bewilderment, was symptomatic of people’s disillusionment with a world whose values courted wanton destruction instead of harmony.
Modernism evolved from romantic, socialist, utopian aspirations coupled with arts and crafts reforms in the wake of industrialism and war; a loose term used retrospectively to describe the broad movement in art, literature, architecture, design and culture, searching to assuage the pain of WWI. Modernism is easier to understand by referencing what it is not:- historicism, traditional, decorative, rooted in academics. The term encompasses the trend in the early to mid 20th century when designers, artists, architects and others sought innovation, leaning towards the abstract in the search for new ways to express aesthetically their reactionary moral and political ideals. The change in direction from historical reference to forward looking was prompted by new political ideals following the Bolshevik Revolution and rise of Communism in Russia and in Europe, with the weakening of the class
Question: To what extent did the ideology of Modernism reflect new sets of values in architecture and design in the period between 1919 and 1960? Answer this question with examination of works of 3 architects/designers of the time analyzing how Modernism was manifested in their works.
ANSWER
Bauhaus’ Walter Gropius said in Germany, 1919, “Today’s artist lives in an era of dissolution without guidance. He stands alone. The old forms are in ruins, the benumbed world is shaken up, the old human spirit is invalidated and in flux towards a new form. We float in space and cannot perceive the new order”. This statement epitomized a Germany suffering shocking economic deprivation from reparations imposed by The Treaty of Versailles 1918. Across Northern France, Germany and Belgium countryside and villages were devastated. Europe was bereft and in chaos. People desperately searched a new order to dispel the atrocities of WWI.
Gropius’ bewilderment, was symptomatic of people’s disillusionment with a world whose values courted wanton destruction instead of harmony.
Modernism evolved from romantic, socialist, utopian aspirations coupled with arts and crafts reforms in the wake of industrialism and war; a loose term used retrospectively to describe the broad movement in art, literature, architecture, design and culture, searching to assuage the pain of WWI. Modernism is easier to understand by referencing what it is not:- historicism, traditional, decorative, rooted in academics. The term encompasses the trend in the early to mid 20th century when designers, artists, architects and others sought innovation, leaning towards the abstract in the search for new ways to express aesthetically their reactionary moral and political ideals. The change in direction from historical reference to forward looking was prompted by new political ideals following the Bolshevik Revolution and rise of Communism in Russia and in Europe, with the weakening of the class
Bibliography: Curtis, William J.R.; Modern Architecture Since 1900 Phaidon Press Ltd, London, 2001. Darling, Elizabeth, Le Corbusier, Carlton Books, London, 2000. Frampton, Kenneth; Modern Architecture, A Critical History, Thames and Hudson, London, 2011. Le Corbusier, Towards a New Architecture, BN Publishing.net, Great Britain, 2008. Lutz, Brian; Knoll, A Modernist Universe, Rizzoli, New York, 2010. McCarter, Robert; Frank Lloyd Wright, Reaktion Books Ltd. London, 2006. McCarter, Robert; On and by Frank Lloyd Wright, A Primer of Architectural Principles, Phaidon Press Limited, London, 2005. Taut, Bruno; Programme for Architecture (1918) referred to by Christine Lodder, Searching for Utopia published in Wilk, Andrew; Modernism Designing a New Word, V & A Publications, London, 2006. Wilk, Christopher; Modernism – Designing a New World, V & A Publications, 2008. Wright, Frank Lloyd; Modern Architecture: The Kahn Lectures (1930). [ 2 ]. McCarter, Robert; Frank Lloyd Wright, Reaktion Books Ltd. London, 2006, p19. [ 4 ]. Taut, Bruno; Programme for Architecture (1918) referred to by Christine Lodder, Searching for Utopia published in Wilk, Andrew; Modernism Designing a New Word, V & A Publications, London 2006 P.25. [ 5 ]. Le Corbusier and Jeanneret Ville Contemporaine 1922. Frampton, Kenneth; Modern Architecture, A Critical History Thames and Hudson, London, 2011, P.155 [ 6 ] [ 7 ]. Wright, Frank Lloyd; Modern Architecture: Being The Kahn Lectures (1930) – as quoted in McCarter Robert; Frank Lloyd Wright, Reaktion Books, London, 2006, P.122 [ 8 ] [ 13 ]. Greenhalgh, Paul, Modernism in Design, Reaktion Books Ltd, London, 1990 p.24