Volume 13, Number 12 · January 1, 1970
Hausbroken
By Peter Lloyd Jones
The Bauhaus, Weimar, Dessau, Berlin, Chicago
by Hans M. Wingler, translated by Wolfgang Jabs, translated by Basil Gilbert
MIT, 696, 778 illustrations pp., $55.00
Painting, Photography, Film
by Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, translated by Janet Seligman
MIT (A Bauhaus Book), 160 pp., $7.95
Principles of Neo-Plastic Art
by Theo Van Doesburg, translated by Janet Seligman, with an Introduction by Hans M. Wingler, Postscript by H.L.C. Jaffé
New York Graphic Society, 73, 30 illustrations, some color pp., $7.50
Graphic Work from the Bauhaus
by Hans M. Wingler, translated by Gerald Onn
New York Graphic Society, 168, 84 illustrations, some color pp., $12.50
Painters of the Bauhaus
by Eberhard Roters
Praeger, 216, 92 plates (33 in color) 12 drawings, with a Bibliography pp., $18.5
Hans Wingler's magnificent book The Bauhaus begins with two illustrated flyleaves. Both are nearly blank. On the left, just slightly off center and near the bottom, is a sketchy drawing by Paul Klee in facsimile. It illustrates the 'Idea and Structure' of the Bauhaus, the pioneering school of design founded by Gropius in 1919. In the middle with a circle around them are the words Bau und Bühne—Building and Theater. Round this circle is a seven-pointed star with each of the crafts or media taught in the various workshops. Circumscribing this star is another circle in which is placed the famous Foundation Course or 'Vorkurs' which was the Bauhaus's distinctive contribution to art pedagogy. An elaborate, perhaps a little overformalized, symbol. At the bottom however (which we had not noticed as we read the Bauhaus program) a small pedestal is drawn. From here a dotted axis goes through the circles to two small pennants placed on top. Klee's device turns a diagram (to be read like a map) into an illusionistic rendering of a globe. The Bauhaus becomes more than a curriculum of study but at once a work of art and a world in itself.
Review, 5171 words
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