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Erich Mendelsohn's Cosmopolitan Vision

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Erich Mendelsohn's Cosmopolitan Vision 29061_J.qxd:36-37 2/26/09 5:51 PM Page 1 Erich Mendelsohn’s Cosmopolitan Vision A recent U.S. exhibition gave this German icon his due. by Laura B. McGuire 1932, “ THE INTERNATIONAL STYLE” ture at UH. The accompanying catalog is an expanded EXHIBITION, curated by Phillip version of Stephan’s 1999 book Erich Mendelsohn, Johnson and Henry-Russell Architect, 1887-1953, and offers comprehensive histori- Hitchcock, opened at the cal essays on his work and life, as well as a broad selec- Museum of Modern Art in tion of the photographs included in the exhibition. New York. Johnson and Born in 1887, Erich Mendelsohn positioned himself Hitchcock, who only grudg- on the cutting edge of architecture in Germany during ingly allowed Erich Mendelsohn’s works into the the 1920s. His Einstein Tower, built in 1920 in Inshow, described them several times as aesthetically Potsdam, brought him international recognition. inferior examples of the International Style. Ironically, Mendelsohn went on to become one of the most suc- 75 years later, the only United States stop on the world cessful commercial architects in Germany, but as a Jew tour of a comprehensive retrospective of Mendelsohn’s he was forced to flee at the height of his career in 1933. work was the Gerald D. Hines College of Architec- He established offices in London and Palestine, before ture at the University of Houston, which Johnson finally settling in the United States in 1941. designed in 1985. Despite the quality and variety of Mendelsohn’s The exhibition Erich Mendelsohn, Dynamics and buildings, traditional accounts of the development of Function: Realized Visions of a Cosmopolitan Architect modernist architecture and the International Style was the largest collection of photographs, models, and have largely overlooked his oeuvre. He has frequently drawings of the German architect’s buildings ever dis- been assigned footnote status in the history of architec- played. Curated by Regina Stephan of the Technische ture and regarded as an Expressionist of the 1920s 36 Universität Darmstadt, the exhibition was organized whose work never truly adhered to the official tenets and sponsored by the Institute for Foreign Cultural of international modernism. This exhibition, along .cite Relations in Germany and co-sponsored by the Hines with other recent scholarship, has sought to counter College of Architecture. It came to Houston last this unfortunate legacy by recognizing Mendelsohn’s September 7 to October 11 through the efforts of unique vision. WINTER2008 Dietmar Froehlich, an associate professor of architec- This exhibition shows that Mendelsohn’s strength 29061_J.qxd:36-37 2/26/09 5:51 PM Page 2 as a designer lay in part in the fact that tury modern architecture atop a hill in his buildings were not easily categorized San Francisco’s Pacific Heights. The within prevailing modernist idioms. His house integrates Corbusian and built works responded with a remark- Wrightian forms to produce a modern able sensitivity to their sites, contexts, house that nevertheless maintains a and uses by integrating a wide variety of dialogue with its site. Supported in modern forms into new and singular some areas by pilotis and in others by a wholes. While this fact reduced his plinth, the three floors of the house are chances for inclusion in the modernist encased behind bands of horizontal canon, it demonstrated Mendelsohn’s wooden cladding that unified the resi- quality as an architect. His buildings dence with its verdant surroundings. drew on many influences but main- OPPOSITE PAGE: Universum Cinema, Berlin, 1926-28. Balconies and wide glass windows tained integrity of purpose and an aes- TOP: Russell House, San Francisco, 1949; BOTTOM: Steinberg Hat Factory, Luckenwalde, 1921-23. occupy every level, providing residents thetic sensibility that favored both multiple views of the hills and the regionalism and sculptural composition buildings in Germany to the exquisite geometries of bay beyond. Mendelsohn set a futuris- over rationalist functionalism. his American synagogues and community centers of tic circular observation deck into one corner of the The drawings, photographs, and models on display the 1940s and 1950s, Mendelsohn fearlessly explored uppermost story, evidencing his willingness to inte- at UH underlined this point. The meticulously crafted the possibilities of material, geometry, and context. grate unexpected geometries into his architecture in models (executed by students at the University of While his early works have in the past received the the face of the formal, rectilinear prescriptions of the Stuttgart) allowed us to see the intensely sculptural most critical attention, his American and Israeli proj- International Style. quality of Mendelsohn’s designs as well as the sophisti- ects occupied a significant share of this exhibition’s With this new exhibition, curator Regina Stephan 37 cation of his surface compositions. The perfect repro- space—happily, because these later works showcase has done a great service in bringing Mendelsohn’s ductions of his sketches were thrilling. Swooping Mendelsohn’s talent as a regional modernist. accomplishments into the public eye. Not only does the .cite curves, vivid colors, and thick charcoal lines made the One of the highlights is the house the architect exhibition reveal Mendelsohn’s great artistic sensitivity, structures leap forward and hover just above the page. designed for Leon B. Russell in 1949. Mendelsohn but it also serves to highlight the true stylistic diversity SKETCH AND PHOTO, BOTTOM: COURTESY OF UH; PHOTO, TOP:WAYNE ANDREWS, ESTO From his 1920s streamlined glass-and-steel business realized this now little-known masterpiece of midcen- of 20th-century modernism. WINTER2008.
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