In February 2019, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen kicks off the Bauhaus centenary with a huge exhibition about the legendary art and design school, whose influence is felt to this day. For the first time, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam spotlights the Dutch Bauhaus network in a wide-ranging retrospective, revealing over sixty artists, designers, architects and other intermediaries from the Netherlands who were personally and artistically involved with the Bauhaus and vice versa between 1919 and 1933.
netherlands ⇄ bauhaus: pioneers of a new world is being staged in the 1,500m2 Bodon Gallery and features almost eight hundred objects and works, a great many being shown for the first time. A book of twenty essays on netherlands ⇄ bauhaus is being published to coincide with the exhibition, along with an interactive guided tour, and Bauhaus-related events staged at locations all over Rotterdam.
netherlands ⇄ bauhaus: pioneers of a new world shows the Bauhaus’s influence in the Netherlands and vice versa. The desire for innovation, idealism, ambitions and creativity—all characteristic of the Bauhaus’s thinking that was disseminated throughout the world. Without social media and present-day technology, these ideas spread through a network of individuals, exhibitions, magazines, conferences, training courses and workshops—not only in Germany, but in the Netherlands, too, particularly after the Bauhaus closed in 1933. The Dutch were active in this network from the start. In the years between the two world wars, Rotterdam was where Modernism found its greatest expression in architecture and design. In netherlands ⇄ bauhaus every visitor will be given a small tablet revealing the links behind the exhibition.
The inspiring relationship between the Netherlands and Bauhaus will be illustrated by artworks, furniture, ceramics, textiles, photographs, typography and architecture. Two hundred of the eight hundred works in the exhibition come from the museum’s own collection. Six hundred are loans and will be coming from more than sixty lenders from the Netherlands and abroad.
Walter Gropius (the founder of the Bauhaus) wrote in the original Bauhaus manifesto: "Architects, sculptors, painters, we all must return to the crafts! For there is no such thing as ‘professional art’. There is no essential difference between he artist and the craftsman. The artist is an exalted craftsman. By the grace of Heaven and in rare moments of inspiration which transcend the will, art may unconsciously blossom from the labour of his hand, but a base in handicrafts is essential to every artist. It is there that the original source of creativity lies."
netherlands ⇄ bauhaus — pioneers of a new world will be on display at the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam from 9 February 2019 — 26 May 2019.
For more visit www.boijmans.nl
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