Next year we will celebrate 100 years of Bauhaus. The AfD in Saxony-Anhalt warns against “glorification” of the art and architecture schools and is heavily criticized for this.
The Saxony-Anhalt AfD parliamentary group sees the Bauhaus as the “misguided path of modernity” and is sticking to its call for a critical debate. Overall, the story of the Bauhaus has not been critically examined enough, said parliamentary group vice-president Hans-Thomas Tillschneider of the German Press Agency.
The Bauhaus, with locations in Berlin, Dessau and Weimar, is considered an important school for art, design and architecture in the 20th century. In the state parliament of Saxony-Anhalt, the AfD is calling for a “critical examination” of the Bauhaus; a corresponding application is to be discussed on Friday. In Saxony-Anhalt, the AfD is classified as right-wing extremist by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution.
Banned by the Nazis in 1933
“Here the AfD shows the face of National Socialism,” said FDP parliamentary group leader Andreas Silbersack. The Bauhaus in 1933 was perceived as the “misguided path of modernity”. 100 years of Bauhaus are a milestone in culture and building history, said Silbersack. Discrediting will not be allowed.
The Bauhaus was founded in Weimar in 1919. Due to the political situation, the facility moved to Dessau in 1925. The art and architecture school experienced its heyday here for a few years. In 1932 the Bauhaus moved from Dessau to Berlin. It was closed there by the Nazis in 1933.
Tillschneider rejects any connections between the current application and the National Socialist era. This criticism is an attempt to avoid a real debate. “That’s cheap,” said Tillschneider. The AfD is not interested in cutting funds; they want to preserve the foundation. But they want to critically examine the “ideology surrounding the Bauhaus”.
Unesco World Heritage Site with more than 100,000 visitors per year
The application states that a “one-sided glorification of the Bauhaus legacy” on the anniversary should be prevented. “The international spread of the Bauhaus style led to a kind of global “uniformity”,” is the AfD’s thesis. There is talk of “historical architectural sins” and a standardization of architecture and design that is detrimental to cultural diversity.
The Bauhaus Dessau Foundation announced that it was addressing the upheavals and also the upheavals that were associated with the material innovations at the beginning of the 1920s. There will be a constructive and critical discussion on the anniversary, said director Barbara Steiner. “The Bauhaus buildings in Dessau attract well over 100,000 people from all over the world every year.” As part of the UNESCO world cultural heritage, these buildings are considered to have a high value, combined with the responsibility and obligation to preserve them.
Source: Stern
I have been working in the news industry for over 6 years, first as a reporter and now as an editor. I have covered politics extensively, and my work has appeared in major newspapers and online news outlets around the world. In addition to my writing, I also contribute regularly to 24 Hours World.
