0:03 the founding of the famous bow house design school was a milestone of the modernness period one that sought to leave the old world behind and embrace a new era the aim was not only to create Innovative designs and groundbreaking architecture but also to construct a radically new Society to this day bous is associated with names like valta gropus Johannes iton po clay and Oscar schl but often overlooked other many women who played a major role and who strongly influenced the world famous bow housee style the history of the bow house as we know it is incorrect when you include the women it becomes a more complete and
0:49 far more interesting picture Sant the promise of absolute equality attracted many women to the bow house almost five 100 female artists studied at the legendary School making groundbreaking contributions yet to this day they remain in the shadow of their male counterparts there this genius myth that says only men can be artistically brilliant while women are diligent and empathetic and all that stuff we still see these prejudices today unfortunately not much has changed the bow house sought profound change they wanted to break with old traditions and change the world and yet
1:34 the school failed badly when it came to equality of the [Music] Sexes they're these very modern artists but in their worldview including when it came to women they were not enlightened at all of course it was also 100 years ago what the bow house woman created significantly shaped our ideas of design today it was through them that Bal housee conquered the design world in the 20th century they included women like Alma busher who created prototypes of avant guard furniture and toys or the Visionary metal Smith and designer Mariana brand whose works are
2:21 counted among the icons of bow house design gz's weaving revolutionized modern textile design fredel Dicker was a multi-talented artist who dedicated herself to bouse until her tragic death in 1944 and it's Lucia Mah's exceptional photographs that still influence how we view bow housee design today it's time to finally tell their stories because as women and as artists they are Role Models bold and inspiring pioneers of modernity [Applause] [Music]
3:09 the bow housee school was founded in the German city of viar in 1919 with its radically new vision of Art and craftsmanship it attracted many young people to the region bow house founder valta gropius promised absolute gender equality and more women than men signed up to study at the Art School gropius was a true Visionary and he made utopian statements that something new was being built there something that everyone could take part in I believe that spoke to these young women because the old dusty Artmy weren't for these modern
3:55 women that Spirit of change was felt not just at the bow house but all over the country in 1918 a war weary Germany experienced a radical new beginning with the proclamation of the Republic women got the vote and entered Parliament with the introduction of women's suffrage something changed in societal attitudes women suddenly became more visible in public more visible in life self determination was in the air and women flocked to the new work opportunities that had opened up especially in the [Music] cities this new woman was the Hallmark
4:40 of the 1920s there were women with bobbed hair there were short skirts and dresses and women felt they could really do something if they had a dream they could fulfill it and that's what characterized this time in Berlin and entire generation embraced a new hedonistic lifestyle and women demanded their right to the public [Music] Arena of course in Berlin you could find women who defined themselves in this way this transformation when it came to gender was happening of course it depended on where you lived in the countryside the new woman might have only existed in the media medany T the Revolutionary bow housee school
5:28 was founded in Sleepy VI of all places here the structures of the old German Empire could still be found and studying at the balouse school was both a new beginning and an act of rebellion a Young Person's decision to go to the bow house deviated significantly from a traditional path because it provided an environment where a different way of living was possible including a different way of relating to the opposite sex the Art School promised both a creative Awakening and an entirely new way of living many young talents as well as established female artists embarked on a completely new start at the school one such artist was
6:13 gzel at 22 she broke off her applied Arts studies in Munich and joined the bow house after her experiences working as a Red Cross nurse in World War I stel wanted to take part in building a new better Society in October 1919 she wrote in her diary I've dreamt about this so many times and now it's come true a new life begins on the first evening gropus spoke very seriously we are facing a void that must be filled and every person [Music] counts I think she was very happy in Vio she always said her time there was
6:59 forgettable and that she belonged to the primordial mud of the bow house what she probably enjoyed the most was the freedom she had there she found like-minded people with artistic Ambitions and they were building a new [Music] world and to be part of that as a woman well the world suddenly became much bigger for her but life at the bow housee did have its rules like skinny dipping in the river ilm spiritual breathing exercises in the park and deor costume parties the bow housee way of life was an affront to conservative viar their lifestyle was decidedly anti-
7:47 Bourgeois for example couples didn't have to get married there were these parties and of course they drank but it wasn't the wild parties with drugs and alcohol that one might think of they expressed themselves mainly sexually I think when their lifestyle is described as wild that's what's meant that they were very open sexually despite the Euphoria of a new beginning the living and working conditions were very hard at the school everyday life in postwar Germany was a challenge and so was life at the bow house the unfun is the beginning of the bow house in Vima was tough the students sat on bare
8:34 concrete floors and had few materials they had very little to eat and went hungry vus introduced a canteen the students tried whenever they could to find potatoes to find something to eat she' tell us that sometimes after eating in the canteen they were still hungry they weren't satisfied so they' pushed the chairs tables aside and dance away their hunger among the financially strapped pioneering students was fredel Dicker in 1919 she wrote Vima has no money and we won't get
9:19 rich either but we don't need it otherwise there's little to say about Vima I hope the bow house sees many positive changes they're needed at the age of 21 fredel dier followed the legendary art educator Johannes iton from Vienna to Vima dicka was a highly gifted and daring designer for her bow house was a place of unlimited experimentation she was a incredibly gifted personality and any areas you can imagine she made all kind of attempts of all kind of materials and uh she made sculptures she made U graphics she did
10:06 everything she was able to make 100 sketches in 10 minutes she drew a cat and didn't like the sketch so she just crumpled it up and threw it in the trash everyone who sees this cat drawing says it's a wonderful sketch made with just a few Strokes fredel Dicker was both uncompromising and bursting with creativity a prolific Creator she mastered a wide variety of disciplines including Graphics product design costume design and painting valta gropus himself praised her work as the very best at The Institute fredel dick could be called an allround artistic talent everything she
10:52 touched somehow became a form everything she did an expression she was undoubtedly an outstanding Talent but soon the female Talent at the school became too much for the men in charge gropus had not reckoned with such an influx of women and in 1920 he backtracked the reason he gave was that women were simply not suitable for heavy craftsmanship he recommended no more unnecessary experiments the so-called female element would no longer occupy more than a third of the student body many female artists felt
11:39 slighted it was said that art is a talent and women didn't have it to Paul Clay Art had to do with genius which women didn't possess when it came to Fine Art he didn't recognize women vas Kandinsky felt the same it was a man's business to do with the intellect and women's business was only about motherhood the promise of equal rights in work was broken by the argument that women can't see in three dimensions and work better with flat surfaces the women's students were thus relegated to the textile Workshop the bow house Master's ideas surrounding gender revealed them as being less than [Music] Progressive the motivation behind sexism
12:26 is usually not a real motivation it's often just stereotypes like the idea that when women do jobs for which they are not suited they might end up destroying things instead women should just do what they already know like [Music] weaving women who came to the bow house with the dream of becoming Architects painters and sculptors suddenly found themselves relegated to the loom and to a skill considered not an art but a handicraft [Music] feared that the high percentage of women would give the impression that the bow house was not a serious Art Academy precisely because there were so many
13:11 women involved gropus wanted his new project to succeed and he was a realist I think and he knew that if the school was associated with having many female students the public might not take it seriously relegated to the so-called women's class the female artists turned the unloved craft of weaving into their own special art form my mother wrote that they felt like they were discovering the craft of weaving a new they didn't want to be taught something based on old traditions little patterns this and that that didn't interest
13:57 them by doing things their way they discovered new types of textiles the women used the famous form and color theories of bow house in their Textile Art in bold color experiments radically new forms were created using handdyed Yarns combined in highly complex weaving techniques the artists used their Fabrics like painting [Music] canvases the Fabrics they created were enormously successful the women really revolutionized textile design there was no more talk of it simply being a Pastime as bow house Master Oscar schl had dismissed it in the entire history of the bow
14:43 house the textile Workshop was undoubtedly one of the most successful Studios they made the most money they sold a lot exhibited a lot and produced a lot but all that was not well received the class was always mentioned blast because they didn't want the textile Workshop to become the Showcase of the institution few female artists succeeded in realizing their full potential outside the women's class the multi-talented frel Dicker refused to be tied to a single Workshop she enjoyed an exceptionally high level of Freedom at the institution Dicker even conquered the men's workshops
15:31 in 1922 fredel Dicker was the first bow house student to design a house with a flat roof she was truly a Pioneer in so many things she did it's impossible to list them all the bow house was soon too small for fredel dicka following projects in Dresden Berlin and Vienna dicka founded an architecture Studio in Vienna along with France singer where she designed bow housee architecture and furniture for a wealthy clientele anyone who followed Trends had a piece from singer dicka in their home they were the fashionable
16:20 designers meanwhile in viar more and more female students were revolting against being exiled to the textile Workshop one of the was Alma busher the 23-year-old had studied art in Berlin and came to the bow house in 1922 despite her enormous Talent as a sculptor of wood she too was sent to the weaving Workshop the young woman resisted and wrote a letter to gropus at the bow house it is no longer usual to admit female students to workshops other than weaving I have never had any connection with thread I request to be excused from the weaving Workshop because my doctor has prohibited me from [Music]
17:05 weaving Alma got lucky she was allowed to go into sculpture because the bow house was planning an exhibition in 1923 and wanted to show the public the state and the Ministry of Finance that they were creating something new so Vos needed something to present she designed a children's room for the house H at a time when such rooms did not really [Music] exist mother created everything from the carpet to the seeding light all the furniture all the toys all of it on her own and as a result she achieved a certain
17:51 status Alma Bush's multifunctional Furniture came at the right time and was well received her prototypes of furniture for the masses were in keeping with gropius's vision of industrial [Music] production the large scale exhibition of 1923 presented bow house to the public for the first time with the controversial art school Under considerable scrutiny the Showcase had to succeed [Music] house masters discussed what the core idea behind the 1923 exhibition could be they came up with the slogan art and
18:37 Technology a new unity and that was the major turning point for bow house the world came to Vima to see what was happening what was being built and what objects this scandalous bwh housee was producing the centerpiece of the exhibition was the housam horn in viar a revolutionary precursor to modern living the school's different workshops came together for the design and layout of the Showcase with the participation of many women the exhibition was popular but it was Alma Bush's furniture that attracted the most attention it was a personal Triumph one that made her a household name far
19:25 beyond the bow house in the city of viar people everywhere wanted to see imma Bush's Furniture she was invited to exhibit articles were written about her it was a big sensation but gpio didn't at all like that she was so successful because he was afraid that the bow housee would now be subsumed under children's furniture and toys the exhibition raised the bow housee profile beyond the German borders attracting even more female artists like Mariana brand the kemet's native was already an established painter when she came to the bow house school but being confronted with the radically new perspective on Art made brand question all her previous
20:12 work in 1900 in 1923 she saw the state bow house exhibition and I think for her it was a positive shock so much so that she decided not to paint anymore um she was so deeply impressed that at the start of her study she burnt everything she had created up till that point because she wanted a fresh start with great enthusiasm BR switched to design and encouraged by Master teacher llo mahol noge she joined the metal Workshop Brandt was the only woman and her male classmates made their disapproval clear I was not warmly welcomed
20:59 the overriding opinion was that women do not belong in the metal Workshop they let their opinion be known by assigning me the most tedious and boring [Music] tasks they deliberately tried to demoralize her in the metal Workshop she put up with it because llo mooli noj the master teacher supported her he wanted her to succeed and she did succeed the metal AR soon became one of the most successful designers at the school her iconic designs were simple and elegant and always in keeping with the principles of the bow
21:46 house in 1924 conservative forces awakened throughout Germany and in turingia the bow house friendly social Democrats were voted out and the school budget cut hostilities increased and the bow housee School became a political porn the school was on the verge of closure when gropius received a lucrative offer from the city of desal in 1925 the bow house moved Desa was not picturesque but as an upand cominging industrial city it did offer New Economic prospects for the new location gropus built residential buildings for the
22:31 master Craftsman and a sensational new school building made of steel and glass a radiant Manifesto of modernism but the now more sober course geared towards mass production no longer appealed to everyone and many left the school for the first time the women were clearly outnumbered and Desa had group in desau groia specially designed a wing where you could sleep and create art it was a very open way of life so you cooked together ate together helped each other out some were students from very far away and it was important for the whole atmosphere that it be very
23:22 International students from all over Europe from the USA and even Japan came to study at the Visionary School creating a diverse community that wanted to reshape not only their environment but the whole world the bow house was entering a new era new ideas require new forms and that means new designs new workshops were created like the soon to be famous architecture Workshop set up in 1927 B housee students were offered collaborations with industry and women too seized the opportunities it was during this time that gulel achieved what no other bous woman did the 30-year-old became the first
24:10 female teacher to head the weaving Department making her the only woman among the bow house masters she crossed out the word student on her University ID card and replaced it with Master but the idea for her appointment as a workshop Master did not come from the master Council [Music] it was a revolution from below a Revolution by the female Weavers they demanded from the master Council thatu be made head of the weaving Department the Masters were horrified by the demands made by the female Weavers but they gave in the Revolt really came from all the
24:55 students at the bow house both men and women supported creating a position for G and that's what happened she was very popular in the weaving department and she was sometimes called the weaving Mama quite simply she had the qualities needed to be the leader of a group I really enjoy having responsibility I now feel that I cannot separate my life and my personal Destiny from the bow house and that is a great source of strength G's Workshop handled large commissions and presented at trade
25:41 fairs her work was formative for modern textile design and is inextricably linked to the bow [Music] house however stel remained legally and financially worse off than her male colleague but she fought back she wrote two letters on the same day in one was her resignation I'm leaving and in the other she wrote If you hire me under the same conditions as the male colleagues I'll stay there were always delays so she was always worse off than the men had no pension benefits and always shortterm
26:27 contracts this this is one of the few written acts of emancipation where you can see that she stood up for herself at that time being discriminated against as a woman was the normal State of Affairs gzel was determined and her request for better Financial conditions was honored a year later but she never got permanent employment it was in Desa that the bow house had its Heyday presenting itself to the world with first class advertising photos and it was a woman who so brilliantly captured bow house architecture and design Lucia mahol was
27:13 not a bow house student but the wife of one of its Masters llo mahol Nodge she took the photos that made bow housee world famous but throughout her life Lucia remained in the shadow of her famous husband as Lucia schz when Lucia Schulz metlo maholi n she was older and more established than the young Hungarian artist who was making a name for himself in Central Europe during the beginning of their partnership she provided the financial support for the couple Lucia Mah's photographs characterized by a precise penetrating
28:01 objectivity as a trained photographer she not only shared her knowledge with her husband but also took on his dark room work using her publishing experience Lucia put her husband's ideas into writing for numerous bow house Publications without ever being credited joint experiments using a photogram were also attributed solely to llo mahol [Music] no I believe her first photography student was probably llo maholi no she was really the photographer of the family but he got all the [Music] credit she photographed all the objects from the bow house for their sample cataloges without getting any
28:48 credit she was also an ad woman and she worked on the bow House's advertisements advertising haded for this B house decades later Lucia mahol sharply criticized the hero worship of the Masters at the bow house as well as the lack of recognition for the women who worked alongside their famous husbands it would not be absurd to write about the role of the bow house Master's wives who had no official status yet played a decisive role in the bow House's history too much has been written about the Masters themselves no need to mention them further the tragedy of Lucia maholi was that while everyone agreed on the importance of her work she received very
29:35 little recognition for it we owe it to her that bow house has a face today with her photograph she defined an image of the bow house that is still valid other individuals such as eaus have done this through their diary entries maholi did it through her very precise very detailed photos during Lucio Mahal's Escape into Exile she had to leave behind more than 500 glass negatives her entire artistic Capital decades later she would see in Publications the photographs she thought had been lost and engage in a tough legal battle for copyright meanwhile the tenacious Mariana brand achieved some success at
30:21 the bow housee in desel finally securing a paid position her job was to negotiate the school contracts with industry contributing significantly to the school's economic [Music] success during those years BR devoted herself increasingly to photography she photographed herself played with gender roles and created profound photo montages that reflected her unique view of the world many of Mariana br's photo montages revolved around the new woman you really get a 1920s feeling from these images
31:08 because the women wore fashionable clothes they were doing things the images really conveyed the spirit of the time in contrast the men were often portrayed as wearers of uniforms they were dressed very formally with rigid personalities perhaps representing an outdated worldview Bar's thoughtful Outlook showed a society lurching towards a new war a premonition that would become a grim reality in just a few [Music]
31:54 years the close collaborative work at the bow house gave rise to increasingly more complex relationships leading to conflicts especially for the women in 1926 Alma busher who'd already made a name for herself in viar with her furniture designs married bouse actor Vera Zid Hof that same year Elma gave birth to a son y despite being a new mother busher continued with her work but she was marginalized at the bow house the superiors stand it when B House women had children the young mother worked tirelessly on her new designs inspired by Progressive education ideas she
32:40 created children's toys that tapped into one of the favorite themes of modernism her toys went into series production with great [Music] success do B look construction toy was a hit at the bow house workshops but the bow house dolls sold the best they said something about Alma's mentality she said children must have freedom and they usually fell into some picturesque poses despite high demand for Bush's products gropius did not let her have her own Studio
33:28 when production delays occurred he explained to busher in a friendly but unambiguous letter that her work at the bow house was their last [Music] priority this this sentence from gropus saying that her work was merely peripheral to Bow housee overall production was completely out of line absolute and gropos had never said anything like that so clearly before it was incredibly painful for her busha was relatively delicate as an artist and she was also the mother of two children people at the bow house just couldn't imagine that a career would
34:14 come out of it and they didn't support it from the start perhaps because it was still too early for such things I the main thing that defined her life was her artistic success at the bow house and what followed was a great [Music] emptiness that ultimately diminished her enjoyment of life she went from being a celebrated bow house artist to suddenly being the wife of a provincial actor
35:00 bar Alma busher left the bow house in 1927 she never designed furniture or toys again many of the women artists who started a family experienced a similar fate and they often had very modern ideas about work and family [Music] life gerred art came to the bow house in 1923 with dreams of becoming an architect she too reluctantly ended up in the weaving Workshop when she married the bow housee architect Alfred aunt in 1928 she Drew up her own marriage contract in which she demanded complete equality between the spouses a wish that would not be fulfilled where his aunt's
35:46 husband was appointed a master of balous Gert found few prospects in desal she turned her talents to photography creating private and Avant guard photographs that would go down in art history she made a series of mask photos self-portraits of her in Disguise which today are considered Classics of bow house Photography they had nothing to do with bow house teachings But ultimately came out of her boredom in the [Music] provinces you could see her as a precursor to Cindy Sherman experimenting with different roles and asking who else
36:32 can I be who am I with a veil with or without a wig if I dress differently what type of woman can I be in her series of self-portraits gertude Aunt flirted with rolls becoming a nun Vamp and Grand the opposite of her real life as a wife and mother of two only gel succeeded in combining work and family life at the bow house but at a very high [Music] price she got married and there was still the expectation that when a woman married she would leave the bow house G
37:19 didn't consider that an option she was a modern woman who wanted to combine work and family [Music] she was attacked for her lifestyle for the fact that she had lived with shaon a Jew got pregnant before she was married and for her leftist sympathies [Music] [Music] saw a power struggle behind the accusations but also blatant anti-Semitism and she handed in her
38:04 notice in 1931 she left the bow house for good and immigrated to [Music] Switzerland it was the 1930s and dark years were to follow for [Music] everyone the bow housee was expelled from Desa and moved to Berlin where only about a fifth of the students were women in 1933 the art school was dissolved and many bow house members received professional banss bow house art was [Music] scorned the Nazi exhibition degenerate art in 1937 showed numerous works by Bow housee artists for most of the artists working became impossible those who
38:51 could escaped into Exile Nazi Germany raged on [Music] the successful designer fredel dier as a Jew in Vienna also felt the effects of the political upheaval after several imprisonments she managed to escape to Prague where she married her new love paral brandise who was also Jewish the couple were deported to the teresian stad Concentration Camp even there fredel Dicker remained true to Art secretly giving drawing and painting lessons to children after the camp was liberated thousands of these children's drawings were [Music]
39:38 found true art feda tried to open a beautiful window for her pupils she didn't want them to work through what they were going through but to think of a beautiful future or simply look at the stars and know that there is another world outside and that life really does go on so it was such a strong impact in the life of many of them because it was in a horrible situation and it was like a way to breathe through colors uh through lines through imagination also even under the worst possible
40:24 conditions fredel Dicker worked on Art education TCH TS children should be trusted unconditionally if we want the best for them we should give them material and encourage them to start working at this stage all our aesthetic judgments are meaningless what's really extraordinary is that these pictures are preserved because she hid these children's works so today we can still see how intensively she processed internalized and passed on bow house teachings for two years fredel Dicker worked with the children in theresian stat she staged plays with them and imparted hope and dignity in a place otherwise devoid of humanity most of the children did not survive when her
41:11 husband was to be transported to alitz fridel Dicker joined a list of volunteers so as not to lose him in October 1944 her train left to inat a day after she arrived at aitz bural fredel Dicker at the age of 46 was gassed her husband survived aitz 45-year-old Elma busher was killed in 1944 in a bombing raid near Frankfurt Aline her children's toys are still being produced today Kul never returned to Germany even
41:56 in old age she ran a handweaving studio in Switzerland she died in 1983 at the age of 86 Mariana brand went into internal Exile during the war and withdrew to her hometown of chemets during the gdr era her artistic Visions were submerged in the standardized style of socialist industrial design in 1983 unnoticed she died at the age of 89 the Jewish communist Lucia mahol fled from the Nazis to England 25 years later she engaged in a bitter legal battle with VTA gropius over her abandoned negatives the lack of recognition for
42:41 her work would never leave her in 1989 she died at the age of 95 in Zurich most of the bow House women did not live to see the late recognition of their work but with their courage creativity and Progressive thinking they have left a lasting Legacy and are still a great inspiration today a century later [Music] [Applause] [Music]
43:27 [Laughter] [Music] for
