The Life Breath of Bauhaus Lives On at MoMA
An interview with an artist in sync with the life breath of Bauhaus.
Tell us, what is your name?
Harald Witzenmann
Describe your art form, all the mediums.
I’m working with metal and paint.
Where and when were you born?
In Munich in 1941
When did you start your creative era in Germany?
From 1953 on. From Munich to the Black Forest Region, one of the jewelry manufacturing centers, then to Southern Bavaria, the cradle of Kandinsky’s Blue Rider Movement.
What year did you move to NYC?
1974.
Please talk to us about Bauhaus (1919-1933)
Laughs.
OK, your awareness of it, as a German Artist.
Bauhaus was a gift to German artistic culture and an art revolution. It was an arts and crafts development in a fluid form. Im fluss. It attracted the most brilliant artists, architects and designers of the time. Like; Kandinsky, Oskar Schlemmer, Paul Klee, Mies van der Rohe and Walter Gropius to name a few. They all came to Weimar, one after another, in order to take part in the shared excitement of creating the new. And Bauhaus is alive to this very day when I see the design of a lounge in a friend’s house.
Did the existence of Bauhaus influence you as a creative person ?
Of course! Paul Klee was one of my early heroes.
Why was that?
If I pick someone from the painting department of Bauhaus, I would choose the meticulous approach of Klee’s drawings. They symbolize the diligence of the architects and designers and all the crafts. A simple line of Paul Klee would make a connection to the ingeniously simple design of a Mies van der Rohe.
Images come to our minds as artists, but how would you describe the visual aesthetic of Bauhaus to a novice?
I was just approaching this. The Bauhaus is like the breeze through the stuffiness of old traditional form.
More specifically, describe attributes of the Paul Klee Painting that first comes to mind.
I would stick to his drawing method, he can teach you the universe of what you can do with a line. His was a teaching method of perspective looking from every angle in the form of little line scribbles. In his paintings the deep line is buried, but there. They have a strong balance of color. He would take blocks of color and arrange them. The form is the line, a geometric shape with a hidden dimension. Which you can find if you take the time to look.
Time to take a break. Harald gets a call from a friend and they begin a passionate discusssion on the Bauhaus in German.
My dogs are barking and need a walk. My car is in a tow zone and needs to be moved. The topic is so engaging, I can’t pull away and Harald can’t let me go.
Bauhaus becomes a highly emotionally charged topic. Why is that?
It couldn’t flourish long in Germany because the times got darker. This creative nucleus was much too early dismantled. The emotion is that we deprived ourselves of the salt in the soup.The very essence of our cultural lives on many levels was dispelled. And to this day I feel sorrow.
How is Buahaus relevant to an international Idea of Modernism?
We all talk about globalization today. Everybody has gotten the bug of Bauhaus. The great architects of our time, the great designers, too. Bauhaus was expelled from Germany, came here to America and blossomed in institutions like MoMA. Bauhaus came full circle. The manifestations of Bauhaus are alive in Germany today.
…and alive at MoMA: Bauhaus 1919-1933: Workshops For Modernity, November 8, 2009-January 25, 2010
Organized by Barry Bergdell and Leah Dickerman