Considering the influence of German art, design and architecture on American art and culture following World War II

One hundred years after the founding of the Bauhaus in 1919, Bauhaus and America considers the myriad ways in which the German art, design and architecture school influenced the art and culture of the United States after the World War II.

Bauhaus and America identifies one particular area of influence: the Bauhaus stage, which functioned like an interdisciplinary laboratory for diverse artistic experiments with light and movement—from light and kinetic art, to experimental film, to dance and performance art.

When the rise of German National Socialism forced the Bauhaus to close in 1933, its members scattered, bringing their experimental ethos with them as they left Germany (many of them headed to the US). Thus the exploration of light and motion that began on the Bauhaus stage continued to spread.

Gathered here are works exploring these themes by, among others, Josef Albers, Oskar Fischinger, László Moholy-Nagy, Wassily Kandinsky, Xanti Schawinsky, Oskar Schlemmer and Andor Weininger—alongside images of those numerous American artists impacted by the Bauhaus legacy, such as Merce Cunningham, Robert Rauschenberg, Sol LeWitt and Barbara Kasten.

Text by Hermann Arnhold, Kristin Bartels, Torsten Blume, Ulrike Gärtner, Andreas Hapkemeyer, Julie Jones, Gail Kirkpatrick, Márton Orosz, Tanja Pirsig-Marshall, Jeanette Redensek, Eline van Dijk, Peter Weibel.

"Focusing sharply on Bauhaus stage performances as sites for experimental multi-media presentations, the authors supplement their investigations with striking photographs of light shows that decades later would be labeled “psychedelic trips.”—Norman Weinstein, ArchNewsNow.