| all photographs via wallpaper* |

i spent a wonderful sunday morning wandering around the bauhaus: art as life exhibition at the barbican centre; the biggest  exhibition of the modern world’s most famous art school in the uk in over 40 years.

exploring the diverse artistic production that made up bauhaus’ turbulent fourteen-year history, the exhibition delved into the subjects at the heart of the school: art, culture, life, politics and society, and the changing technology of the age. it was fascinating to see the chronological progression of the school’s ethos and identity, and see the wide-ranging influences their designs had on modern design as we know it today.

for me, the stand-out designs were the graphics, particularly the typography and advertising posters, but also the highly stylised catalogs and bauhaus journal covers, each one a poetic love story to the geometric forms of constructivism and de stijl. i also loved the architectural model of the bauhaus dessau, which crystallised modernist ideas of space, form and construction, and all of the photographic documentation of the daily life on campus; it looked like such a hot-bed of creativity, inspiration and innovation!

and with my strong penchant for interior products i was drawn to the modernist style seating designs as well as a beauuutiful 1927 tea infuser by marianne brandt, which i later discovered had sold at auction at sotheby’s in 2007, for an astonishing $361,000, breaking the sale record for bauhaus design. well, no wonder i was so enthralled by it!

bauhaus: art as life, 3 may – 12 august 2012, barbican art gallery

| source : dezeen |