Before the Bauhaus: Architecture, Politics, and the German State, 1890–1920 (Modern Architecture and Cultural Identity) - Softcover

Maciuika, John V.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0521728223 ISBN 13: 9780521728225

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2008

Synopsis

Before the Bauhaus re-evaluates the political, architectural, and artistic cultures of pre-World War I Germany. As contradictory and conflict-ridden as the German Second Reich itself, the world of architects, craftsmen and applied-arts 'artists' were not immune to the expansionist, imperialist, and capitalist struggles that transformed Germany in the quarter-century leading up to the First World War. In this study, John Maciuika brings together architectural and design history, political history, social and cultural geography. He substantially revises our understanding of the roots of the Bauhaus and, by extension, the historical roots of twentieth-century German architecture and design. His book sheds new light on hotly contested debates pertaining to the history of Germany in the pre-World War I era, notably the issues surrounding 'modernity' and 'anti-modernity' in Wilhelmine Germany, the character and effectiveness of the government administration, and the role played by the nation's most important architects, members of the rising bourgeois class, in challenging the traditional aristocracy at the top of the new German economic and social order.

About this title

Review:

'Maciuika is well-informed and writes in a clear and scholarly way ...' The Architectural Review

Book Description:

Before the Bauhaus reevaluates the political, architectural, and artistic cultures of pre-World War I Germany. The world or architects, craftsmen and applied-arts 'artists' were not immune to the issues leading up to the First World War. This study substantially revises our understanding of the roots of the Bauhaus and, by extension, the historical roots of twentieth-century German architecture and design.

About this edition

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0521728223
• ISBN 13: 9780521728225
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 404