weimar republicconcept:era modern
Cathedral (Bauhaus Manifesto woodcut)
Woodcut print (1919) by Lyonel Feininger, used as the frontispiece to Walter Gropius's Bauhaus Manifesto (April 1919). Depicts a Gothic cathedral with three stars above — the unity of painting, sculpture, and architecture under the 'cathedral of the future.' The founding image of the Bauhaus.
Scholarly Significance
Feininger's woodcut Cathedral (1919) is the frontispiece of the Bauhaus Manifesto — the founding image of the Bauhaus movement, depicting a cathedral of the future as a symbol of the unity of the arts.
Notes
- ·Walter Gropius invited Feininger to be the first Bauhaus master in April 1919; the Cathedral print was the visual centerpiece of the founding manifesto.
- ·Gropius's manifesto text: 'The ultimate aim of all creative activity is building... The new building of the future will embrace architecture and sculpture and painting in one unity.'
- ·The three stars above the cathedral represent the three arts (painting, sculpture, architecture) reunited under the Gesamtkunstwerk ideal.
- ·Feininger was at this time developing his Cubist-Expressionist 'Prismatic' style, visible in the crystalline faceting of the cathedral.
- ·Feininger remained at the Bauhaus from 1919 to 1933; unlike many masters, he was not formally a teacher but 'master of the print workshop.'
- ·Lyonel Feininger (1871–1956) was born in New York to German parents; he spent most of his career in Germany before returning to the US after the Nazi seizure of power.
- ·The woodcut is one of the most reproduced images of 20th-century art history and a foundational document of the Bauhaus movement.