![[Logo Auswärtiges Amt]](/images/logo.gif){kind=logo}
Museum of Design Atlanta (MODA) Presents "Marcel Breuer: Design and Architecture"
-
- Enlarge image
- Marcel Breuer in the Wassily chair (B3), ca. 1926
- (© Constance L. Breuer)
To kick off their 2009/2010 season, the Museum of Design Atlanta (MODA) partners with the Atlanta-Fulton Public Library System to present a dual location exhibit featuring the work of world- renowned German furniture designer and architect Marcel Breuer (1902-1981), arguably one of the most influential designers of the modernist period. Open to the public October 27 – January 16, 2010, the exhibt will be housed at both the MODA galleries and Atlanta-Fulton Public Library Central Branch, the last major public building Breuer designed.
-
- Enlarge image
- Atlanta Central Public Library, 1977-80
- (© Architectural Photography of Atlanta)
The Marcel Breuer retrospective conceived and organized by Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein, Germany is the very first exhibition that also appropriately presents all the different fields in which he was active - and treats them as equal aspects of his oeuvre. While the thematically structured show displays almost all Breuer's major items of furniture design, his very wide-ranging architectural work is essentially presented in the form of 12 exemplary buildings. In its section entitled "Materials", the exhibition documents Breuer's design work chronologically. It takes its cue from the fact that in his furniture designs he used four different materials, one after the other: solid wood, tubular steel, aluminum and plywood.
-
- Enlarge image
- Interior for the living room at Haus am Horn, Weimar, 1923
- (© Bauhaus University Weimar)
“I can think of no better place to celebrate the architectural work of Marcel Breuer than in one of his own buildings,” said Brenda Galina, executive director of MODA. “We are honored to share this special exhibit with the Atlanta-Fulton Public Library System and give Atlantans this unique opportunity to experience the work of this important and innovative designer.”
"Marcel Breuer: Design and Architecture" will be on display to the public at both MODA (285 Peachtree Center Avenue, Marquis II Tower, Atlanta, GA 30303) and Atlanta-Fulton Public Library System’s Central Branch (One Margaret Mitchell Square, Atlanta, GA 30303). Tickets can be purchased at either location and are valid for entrance at both exhibits.
For more information, visit www.museumofdesign.org
-
- Enlarge image
- Robinson House, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1947-8
- (© David Sundberg)
Marcel Breuer
As a designer and architect, Marcel Breuer (1902-1981) can be regarded as one of the most influential and inportant designers of the 20 th century.
As a young student at the Bauhaus Weimar, Breuer, who was Hungarian by birth, caught the eye with various furniture designs inspired by the Dutch De Stijl group. In 1925, in other words at the tender age of only 23, he "invented" tubular steel furniture, a quite revolutionary development and considered his core contribution to the history of design. Breuer’s tubular steel designs, such as the famous Wassily armchair, the Bauhaus stool or his various cantilever chairs are representative for the design of an entire epoch, and thus comparable only with Wagenfeld’s legendary table luminaire. In the shape of millions of copies they have long since taken a firm place among the great classics of Modernism.
Yet it was not only tubular steel furniture that helped Breuer make an international splash. He was likewise a design history trailblazer with his aluminum and bent laminated wood furniture designs produced in the 1930s, inspiring subsequent generations of designers. From today’s viewpoint, his legendary interior designs seem no less important. One need think only of his creations for Walter Gropius’ "Master House" in Dessau (1925/26), for the apartment of famous theater director Erwin Piscator in Berlin (1927), or the interiors designed at a later date in England and America that so strongly influenced 20 th century living rooms.
-
- Enlarge image
- Slatted chair ti 1 a, 1924
- (© Vitra Design Museum Archive)
Now, Breuer may have in the space of only a few years progressed from Bauhaus student to become a furniture and interior designer held in high esteem by the entire European avant-garde, but he himself wished first and foremost to be an architect. At the latest as of the mid-1920s he construed building as the real goal of his work. Following a sluggish start in Europe and (as of 1937) in the United States, primarily owing to the Great Depression and World War II, his career as an architect took off as of the mid-1940s. His New York-based studio at first made a name for itself with detached houses. As of the early 1950s, Breuer also realized numerous prestigious large-scale projects, among others creating various buildings that were at the forefront of international debates, such as the Unesco Headquarters in Paris (1952-8; together with Nervi and Zehrfuss) or the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York (1964-6). His trademark was to be the sculptural use of concrete - which he preferred predominantly as it could be molded and possessed such massiveness. He exploited the structural opportunities afforded by concrete in a quite congenial manner for his extraordinary spatial creations, whereby in particular his church buildings are worthy of note. He also made use of concrete to give his facade lattices a 3D and highly varied look, and in the process decisively expanded and refined the formal vocabulary of Modernist architecture. Until 1976, when illness forced him to abandon an active career, Breuer, who by then had won countless major awards, was one of the most prominent figures in Western architecture.
Source: Vitra Design Museum, Weil am Rhein
About Museum of Design Atlanta (MODA)
Located in Downtown Atlanta, MODA is the only museum in the Southeast devoted exclusively to the study and celebration of all things design. MODA examines how design affects our daily lives through engaging exhibitions, K-12 educational outreach and exciting adult programming. MODA regularly features exhibitions of architecture, industrial and product design, interiors and furniture, graphics, fashion, and more. For more information, visit: www.museumofdesign.org.
