Germany’s far-right AfD party has turned its fire on the Bauhaus movement, just as the hallowed school of architecture and design approaches its centenary.
The Bauhaus movement of the 1920s, with its groundbreaking ethos of uniting form and function, redefined ideas about art, industrial design and building, but was banned by the Nazis in 1933 as ‘degenerate art’.
As the campaign season gets underway towards the February 23 general election, the Bauhaus style has been dragged into the latest culture war by the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.
Ahead of the 100th anniversary of the Dessau Bauhaus School in 2025, the party has tabled a motion in the Saxony-Anhalt state parliament condemning the “simplistic glorification of the Bauhaus heritage.”
In a speech to the regional assembly, the AfD’s Hans-Thomas Tillschneider accused that the Bauhaus style had “inspired architectural sins of crushing ugliness”.
The party, usually more concerned with immigration and security than with cultural issues, demanded a more “critical examination” of the style invented in Weimar in 1919 by architect Walter Gropius.
Tillschneider blamed the Bauhaus school for inspiring gray concrete blocks in the former East Germany, but said its influence could also be seen “in many West German cities.”
– ‘Vision of horror’ –
Bauhaus pioneers were guided by the principle that “form follows function” and by the goal of creating objects and buildings with clean lines and no frills that are durable, affordable and aesthetically pleasing.
Their modernist ideas have left their mark on everything from teapots to tower blocks and Ikea furniture.
Bauhaus architects were also called in by the communist government of East Germany to assist in the construction of public housing, in a style using precast concrete elements known as “Plattenbau”.
Tillschneider said these buildings were “a vision of horror” and represented “life in the smallest of spaces full of prohibitions and restrictions.”
In the motion, the AfD also said that the Bauhaus style sought to promote a “universal aesthetic” and an ideology with a “clear proximity to communism.”
The motion was strongly rejected by all other parties and was heavily criticized by representatives of the cultural sector.
Barbara Steiner, director of the Bauhaus Foundation in Dessau, said she had no objection to a “critical examination” of the movement.
“We want to do that too, and we already do that,” she said.
After six years in Weimar, the Bauhaus school moved to Dessau in 1925 under political pressure from the Nazis in the state of Thuringia.
Today, visitors to the Bauhaus campus in Dessau can learn about the history of the movement and how it has adapted to modern challenges such as climate change.
Steiner said the AfD’s claims were “absurd” and did not recognize the “progress” that the Plattenbau style represented.
“After the war, people moved into these buildings because they had hot water, a balcony and no leaks in the ceiling,” she said.
– ‘Attention-grabbing’ –
Political scientist Natascha Strobl said the AfD’s comments are unlikely to resonate with the German public because “no one is shocked by the Bauhaus architecture anymore.”
But the inflammatory rhetoric could serve as a means to “draw attention” without risking alienating voters, as “the AfD doesn’t get votes from academia and culture anyway,” she said.
Since the controversy broke out, visitors to Dessau have become more curious about the history of the Bauhaus movement, according to Steiner.
After the Bauhaus school was banned in 1933, almost half of its 1,200 students left the country, but 200 joined the Nazi party.
Fritz Ertl, 30, helped design the Auschwitz concentration camp, while fellow Bauhaus student Herbert Bayer sketched an Aryan “superman” for a Nazi propaganda poster.
“National Socialism was not just about tradition,” but also about “strategically” incorporated elements of modernity, said Bauhaus art historian Anke Bluemm.
The AfD declined to comment on the controversy when contacted by AFP.
Steiner said the foundation had had a “constructive” dialogue with local party representatives and was keen to continue the conversation.
“But this won’t be the last we hear from them,” she said, predicting a revival of the controversy ahead of the Dessau school’s 100th anniversary in September.
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