Picturing Socialism: Public Art and Design in East Germany 9781350067141, 9781350067172, 9781350067165

Table of contents :
Cover page
Halftitle page
Title page
Copyright page
Contents
List of Figures
List of Plates
Preface
Acknowledgements
Glossary and Abbreviations
Introduction
History and parameters of public art in the GDR: An overview
The place of architectural art in post-1990 scholarship and history making
Contexts of architectural art
Commissioning
Gender
Sources and methodology
Texts
Works of art and design – an archaeological search
Structure and chapters
PART ONE Reconstruction, Art and Ornament (1945 to 1963)
Chapter 1 Modernism, Realism and Muralism – the Struggle for Art in Post-fascist Germany
Axes of modernity in the pre-war period
The first national Dresden exhibition in 1946
The onset of the cultural Cold War
Chapter 2 The Synthesis of Art and Architecture During the Transition to Industrialized Building
Reorientation in Moscow
Implementing the realist Modernist hybrid
PART TWO Developing a Realist Modernism (1959 to 1973)
Chapter 3 Reconceptualizing the Place of Art in the System-built Environment
The future for art in architecture –reform and resistance
The appearance of the new built environment
Resistance to Schmidt’s conception
Socialist beauty between art, the Bauhaus and dematerialization
Departures towards a conception of design
Realist-Modernist Colour
Architectural art reconfigured as a function of design
Conclusion
Chapter 4 New Socialist Landscapes and the Building of Halle-Neustadt
Halle-Neustadt: ‘A chance to change the world’
Complex Environmental Design in practice
Iconography and interpretation
The challenge of Complex Environmental Design in the late 1960s
Chapter 5 Expanding the Remit of Realism in the Public Art of Halle-Neustadt
Willi Sitte’s Kulturhalle painting
Sigbert Fliegel’s conception for a dynamic programme of art and design
Josep Renau’s panorama of murals for the Education Centre in Halle-Neustadt
A troubled relationship with the Mexican collective mural tradition
PART THREE From the Monumental to the Unreal (1973 to 1990)
Chapter 6 A Space of Pure Possibility: The X. Weltfestspiele and its Impact on Public Art
Evaluation of the X. Weltfestspiele
The influence of the X. Weltfestspiele on the artistic concept for Marzahn
Chapter 7 ‘Ultimately, Ordinary People Want to Have a Bit of Kitsch’: How Socialist Realism Looked Unreal
Conclusion
Select Bibliography
List of Interviewees
Biographies
Index

Citation preview

Picturing Socialism

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Picturing Socialism Public Art and Design in East Germany

J. R. Jenkins

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BLOOMSBURY VISUAL ARTS Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK 1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA 29 Earlsfort Terrace, Dublin 2, Ireland BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY VISUAL ARTS and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc eBook editions first published in Great Britain 2020 Print edition first published in Great Britain 2021 © J. R. Jenkins, 2021 J. R. Jenkins has asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. For legal purposes the Acknowledgements on p. xvi constitute an extension of this copyright page. Cover design by J. R. Jenkins Cover image © Archiv Rolf Walter All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. The author and publisher gratefully acknowledge the permission granted to reproduce the copyright material in this book. Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders of images and to obtain their permission for the use of copyright material. The publisher apologizes for any errors or omissions in copyright acknowledgement and would be grateful if notified of any corrections that should be incorporated in future reprints or editions of this book. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN: HB: 978-1-3500-6714-1 ePDF: 978-1-3500-6716-5 eBook: 978-1-3500-6715-8 Typeset by RefineCatch Limited, Bungay, Suffolk To find out more about our authors and books visit www.bloomsbury.com and sign up for our newsletters

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Contents

List of Figures vii List of Plates xi Preface xiv Acknowledgements xvi Glossary and Abbreviations xviii

Introduction

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Part One Reconstruction, Art and Ornament (1945 to 1963) 29 1 Modernism, Realism and Muralism – the Struggle for Art in Post-fascist Germany 31 2 The Synthesis of Art and Architecture During the Transition to Industrialized Building 47

Part Two Developing a Realist Modernism (1959 to 1973) 79 3 Reconceptualizing the Place of Art in the System-built Environment 81 4 New Socialist Landscapes and the Building of Halle-Neustadt 101 5 Expanding the Remit of Realism in the Public Art of Halle-Neustadt. 137 v

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Contents

Part Three From the Monumental to the Unreal (1973 to 1990) 155 6 A Space of Pure Possibility: The X. Weltfestspiele and its Impact on Public Art 157 7 ‘Ultimately, Ordinary People Want to Have a Bit of Kitsch’: How Socialist Realism Looked Unreal 179 Conclusion

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Select Bibliography 207 List of Interviewees 210 Biographies 212 Index 219

List of Figures

Map of GDR. © J. R. Jenkins. 0.1 Detail of Gerhard Bondzin, ‘Der Weg der Roten Fahne’, (Fig 2). Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019. 0.2 Kulturpalast (Palace of Culture), Dresden, Wolfgang Hänsch. Mural: Gerhard Bondzin, ‘Der Weg der Roten Fahne’, 1969. Photograph Dresden © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Manfred Thonig. 0.3 Haus des Lehrers (House of Teachers), Hermann Henselmann. Mural: Walter Womacka, 1965. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Andrea Ulbricht. 0.4 Detail of Walter Womacka, ‘Unser Leben’ on Haus des Lehrers, 1964. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019. 0.5 Suhl, city centre, model, 1969. Photograph Berlin © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Asmus Steuerlein. 1.1 ‘Großkraftwerk Hirschfelde’, (Hirschfelde Power Plant), Collective Siegfried Donndorf, Willy Illmer, Fritz Tröger, Dresden 1949. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / LBS. 1.2 ‘Feinmechanik Zeiss-Ikon’ (Fine Mechanics Zeiss-Ikon), Collective Max Erich Nicola and Jürgen Seidel, Dresden, 1949. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / LBS. 1.3 First Cultural Conference of the SED, 1948. Photograph Berlin © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Abraham Pisarek. 2.1 Decorative Ceramics. Stalinallee (artist not identified), Section C, Architect Richard Paulick, 1952. Photograph J. R. Jenkins 2019. 2.2 Ornamental painting. As Figure 2.1. 2.3 Figures on Stalinallee (artist not identified), Section C, Architect Richard Paulick, 1952. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019. 2.4 Figures on former Grassi Museum and adjacent building, Leipzig. Photographs © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 2.5 Alfred Thiele and Gisela Richter-Thiele, Leipzig, 1955. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 2.6 Max Lachnit, ‘Flugwille des Menschens’ (The Human Will to Flight), Dresden, 1958. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Walter Möbius.

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43 44 53 53 54 54 55

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2.7 2.8 2.9

2.10 2.11 2.12 2.13

2.14

2.15 2.16 2.17 3.1

4.1 4.2 4.3

4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7

List of Figures

Wolfgang Rauda, Güntzpalast, (Güntz Palace), Dresden, 1955. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Walter Möbius. 60 Max Lachnit, ‘Lehre und Forschung’ (Teaching and Research), Dresden, 1956/7. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019. 61 Magdalene Kreßner, ‘Musizierende Kinder beim Karneval’ (Children Making Music at the Carnival), Dresden, 1955. Photograph © Antje Kirsch. 62 Max Lachnit, ‘Wissenschaftler und Künstler’ (Scientists and Artists), Dresden, 1953/5. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019. 63 As Figure 2.10. 63 Jürgen von Woyski, reliefs. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019. 64 Entrance portal, Berlin, 1955. Architect: Selman Selmanagic. Reliefs: as Figure 2.12. Frieze: Toni Mau. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019. 65 Jürgen von Woyski, ‘Kinderreigen’ (Children’s Ring-a-Ring of Roses), Hoyerswerda, 1964. Photograph Hoyerswerda © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Kurt Heine. 65 Kurt Heinz Sieger, Hoyerswerda, 1959. © Archiv Kurt Heinz Sieger. 74 Kurt Heinz Sieger, Eisenhüttenstadt, 1961. © Archiv Kurt Heinz Sieger. 74 Karl-Heinz Steinbrück and Herbert Morys, Hoyerswerda, 1956. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 75 Karl-Heinz Adler and Friedrich Kracht, Serielles Betonformsteinsystem (Modular Concrete Form System), 1976. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Reinecke. 92 Halle-Neustadt, model, 1969. Photograph Berlin © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Manfred Thonig. 106 Thematic plan for works of art in the first four Living Complexes of Halle-Neustadt. Drawing © J. R. Jenkins. 110 Karl-Heinz Adler and Friedrich Kracht, ‘Zierbrunnen’ (Ornamental Fountain), Dresden-Neustadt, 1979. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek/ Hans Reinecke. 114 Leonie Wirth, ‘Pusteblumen’ (Dandelions), Dresden, 1969. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Richard sen. Peter. 114 Leonie Wirth, ‘Glasbrunnen’ (Glass Fountain), Dresden, 1975. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019. 115 Manfred Vollmert, ‘Brunnenplastik’ (Fountain Sculpture), Hoyerswerda, 1972. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 116 Willi Neubert, Enamel on steel structure, Halle-Neustadt, 1965/6. Photograph © VG BILD-KUNST, Bonn/Neubert, Willi / SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Henrik Ahlers. 118

List of Figures

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4.16 4.17 4.18 4.19 4.20 4.21 5.1 5.2

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Plan for works of art and design in the Living Complexes of Karl Marx Allee, 1962. Drawing © J. R. Jenkins, based on VEB Berlin-Projekt ‘Autorenkollektiv Karl Marx Allee’. 123 Inge Götze, ‘Lob der Poesie’ (In Praise of Poetry), Appliqué, 1972. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Waltraud Rabich. 125 Willi Sitte, ‘Freundschaft’ (Friendship), Production: Ilse-Maria Krause, 1958. © DACS 2020. Photograph © Joachim Blobel 2006 (original in colour). Custody Sammlung Burg Giebichenstein, Kunsthochschule Halle. 126 Martina Stark, ‘Die Biologin’ (The Biologist), 1979. Photograph © Joachim Blobel 2006 (original in colour). Custody Sammlung Burg Giebichenstein, Kunsthochschule Halle. 127 Gerhard Bondzin, ‘Mensch und Natur’ (Man and Nature), Cottbus, 1980. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 128 Gerhard Geyer, ‘Vier Wissenschaftler aus vier Jahrhunderten’ (Four Scientists from Four Centuries), Halle-Neustadt, 1972. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Henrik Ahlers. 129 Senta Baldamus, ‘Chemieingenieurin’ (Chemistry Engineer), Bronze, Halle-Neustadt, 1970/3. Photograph © Dagmar Schmidt 1993, ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-SA 3.0) https://creativecommons. org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en. 130 Baldur Schönfelder, ‘Mondstation’ (Moon Station), play apparatus, Berlin, 1972. © Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-L0805-0006 / Junge, Peter Heinz / CC-BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by-sa/3.0/de/deed.en 130 Rudolph Grunemann, ‘Chemie und Landwirtschaft’ (Chemistry and Agriculture), Schwedt/Oder, 1967. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2012. 130 Irmtraud Ohme ‘Chemiebrunnen’ (Chemistry Fountain), Halle-Neustadt, 1971. Photograph © Jim Cooper. 130 Walter Womacka, ‘Die Wissenschaft erobern’ (Conquer Science), Berlin, 1962. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2012. 130 Fritz Eisel, ‘Der Mensch bezwingt den Kosmos’ (Man Conquers the Cosmos), Potsdam, 1972. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2012. 130 Erich Enge, ‘Kosmonaut’ (Cosmonaut), Schwedt, 1967. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2012. 131 Erich Enge, ‘Lenin’s Worte wurden Wahr’ (Lenin’s Words Came True), Halle-Neustadt, 1971. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 135 Joachim Bach and Willi Sitte, Model for Cultural Centre in Halle-Neustadt, 1967. © Bach. 141 Willi Sitte, ‘Freiheit der sozialistischen Persönlichkeit’ (Freedom of the Socialist Personality), Sketch, 1967. Sketch © DACS 2020. 142

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5.5 5.6 6.1 6.2 7.1

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List of Figures

Sigbert Fliegel research for sight lines within Living Complex Four, Halle-Neustadt. Drawing © J. R. Jenkins based on Sigbert Fliegel drawing. Josep Renau, ‘Der Marsch der Jugend in die Zukunft’ (The March of Youth Into the Future), Halle-Neustadt, 1970. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Henrik Ahlers. Josep Renau’s research for a panorama of murals in Halle-Neustadt. Drawing © J. R. Jenkins. Josep Renau, student housing murals, Halle Neustadt. (see Fig 5.5.) © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Henrik Ahlers. Moment from the X. Weltfestspiele (X. World Festival Games), 1973. © Deutsche Fotothek / Norbert Vogel. Lutz Brandt, Mural, ‘Reflexionen’ (Reflections), Berlin, 1979. Photograph © Lutz Brandt. Ludwig Engelhardt, ‘LPG-Bauern’ (LPG Farmers), 1977/8. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Walther Reineck, Mecklenburg. Jo Jastram and Reinhard Dietrich, ‘Brunnen der Lebensfreude’ (Fountain of the Joy of Life), Rostock, 1980. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Uwe Gerig. Inge Jastram, ‘Blumenstrauss’ (Bouquet), Rostock-Schmarl, 1979. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013.

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List of Plates

The colour plates are also reproduced as monochrome figures within the main text. The monochrome versions are integrated into the main text and this list provides the page numbers for those images. The colour images appear in the separate plate section. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

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Walter Womacka, ‘Unser Neues Leben’ (Our New Life), Eisenhüttenstadt, 1956/58. Photograph © Martin Maleschka 2020. 68 Arno Mohr, ‘Wendepunkt’ (Turning Point), Berlin, 1956. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019. 66 Detail of ‘Unser Neues Leben’ (Plate 1). Photograph © Martin Maleschka 2020. 68 Kurt Robbel, ‘Hafenszene’ (Harbour Scene), Berlin, 1956. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019. 67 Willi Neubert, ‘Die Presse als Kollektiver Organisator’ (The Press as Collective Organiser), Halle, 1964. © DACS 2020. 138 Willi Neubert, ‘Lebensbaum’ (Tree of Life), Halle-Neustadt, 1966. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 139 Willi Neubert, ‘International Solidarität’ (International Solidarity), Suhl, 1977. Photograph (Thale) © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 120 Willi Neubert, ‘300 Jahre Eisenhüttenwerk’ (300 Years of the Steel Works), Thale, 1985. © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 121 Ingrid Müller Kuberski, ‘Chemie und Landwirtschaft’ (Chemistry and Agriculture), Tapestry, 1961. Photograph © Joachim Blobel 2006. Custody Sammlung Burg Giebichenstein, Kunsthochschule Halle. 124 Josep Renau, ‘Die friedliche Nutzung der Atomenergie’ (The Peaceful Use of Atomic Energy), Halle, 1971. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2011. 147 Detail of ‘Die Beherrschung der Kräfte der Natur’ (Plate 12). Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2011. 152 Josep Renau, ‘Die Beherrschung der Kräfte der Natur’ (Mastery of the Forces of Nature), Halle-Neustadt, 1974. Photograph © Martin Maleschka 2020. 151 xi

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List of Plates

Walter Womacka, ‘Gemeinschaftsarbeit der sozialistischen Länder’ (Collective Work of Socialist Countries), Eisenhüttenstadt, 1965. Photograph © Gottfried Hoffmann 2008. Work has been modified. Creative Commons (CC BY 3.0) https://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by/3.0/deed.en. 69 Detail of ‘Gemeinschaftsarbeit der sozialistischen Länder’ (Plate 13). Photograph © J.R. Jenkins 2010. 70 Fritz Eisel, ‘Die Berg- und Energiearbeiter der Region’ (The Miners and Energy Workers of the Region), Hoyerswerda, 1984. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 70 View of ‘Die Berg- und Energiearbeiter der Region’, on the House of the Miners and Energy Workers. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 71 Klaus Wittkugel typography, Berlin, 1965. Photograph © Stefan Trummer. 119 Irmela and Martin Hadelich, ‘Die Erde hat Genug Brot für Alle’ (The Earth has Enough Bread for All), Halle-Neustadt, 1968. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2011. 111 Ronald Paris, ‘Triumph des Todes, Triumph des Lebens’ (Triumph of Death, Triumph of Life), Schwedt, 1978. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2012. 193 View of X. Weltfestspiele X. World Festival Games, posters, Berlin, 1973. © Fotoarchiv Rolf Walter. 160 Flag tower, Berlin, 1973. Photograph © Fotoarchiv Rolf Walter. 162 Lutz Brandt, Design for a flag tower for the X. Weltfestspiele, X. World Festival Games, Berlin, 1973. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2011. 162 Axel Bertram, Designs for the X. Weltfestspiele X. World Festival Games, Berlin, 1973. © Estate Axel Bertram. 159 Axel Bertram, Poster for the X. Weltfestspiele X. World Festival Games, Berlin, 1973. © Estate Axel Bertram. 161 Peter Baumbach and Jürgen Deutler, Stepped apartments and modular facades, Rostock-Schmarl. Photograph © Jürgen Deutler. 188 Inge Jastram, ‘Zahlengiebel’ (Number Wall), Rostock-Schmarl, 1976/77. Photograph © Jürgen Deutler. 190 Peter Baumbach and Jürgen Deutler, Community painted entranceways, Rostock-Schmarl. Photograph © Jürgen Deutler. 192 Hans-Joachim Triebsch, ‘Hallesche Szene’ (Halle Scene), Halle, 1988. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2011. 183 Detail of ‘Hallesche Szene’ (Plate 29). 184 Erika Stürmer-Alex, ‘Vögelfrau’ (Bird Woman), Eisenhüttenstadt, 1987. © Archiv EST. 181

List of Plates

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Erika Stürmer-Alex, ‘Fisch’ (Fish), Eisenhüttenstadt 1985/7. © Archiv EST. Stephan Horota, ‘Paar in der Badewanne’ (Couple in the Bath), Berlin, 1982. © OTFW, Berlin. Cropped and converted to monochrome. ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-SA 3.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/.

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Preface

When I moved to eastern Berlin following the fall of the Wall I wanted to understand what the GDR had been. Although the newspapers were full of stories of tragedy and triumph, victims and culprits, this was not what I was looking for. I had many encounters with people from different sections of East German society – those who saw opportunity, others who were melancholic, and some who told me I would never be able to understand. East Berliners sometimes saw me as rather exotic and would ask about the smog in London. Inspired by Barbara Kruger, but long pre-dating Banksy, I spent my time printing and fly-posting prints about the new freedoms around the Mitte district of Eastern Berlin. The poster was hardly the medium of the moment: professors of poster design at Hochschule der Künste in West Berlin where I made my screenprints were retiring and were replaced by specialists in time-based media and computer-aided design. Twenty years later, the GDR seemed to be slipping into history and I decided to move to academic study. By this time, buildings, murals, works of art, interiors, typography, which it had once seemed there was plenty of time to photograph, had disappeared. Even the people seemed to have disappeared. It was the locals who had become exotic. I chose to research the East German mural because it seemed to me to offer in a single image a way to draw together my interests. I appreciated its posterlike qualities and its claim for a pedagogical impact. This loss and deterioration of visual evidence of East Germany’s visual arts in public space was offset by the gain of a historical perspective. The writing that I had been looking for in the early 1990s was developing. David Crowley was at the forefront of that literature and his interest and expertise, alongside that of authority on German design history, Jeremy Aynsley, took me to London. I had once imagined Design History to be a preoccupation with Clarice Cliff teacups and Dieter Rams stereo sets, but at the Royal College of Art I discovered a field which allowed for an understanding of the cultural conditions surrounding design with a broad understanding of what might constitute an act or object of design. The relationship between aesthetics, form and function, between user and maker, between ideas and materiality, experience and intention, questions of economics, production and outcomes – all central to design – were a part of my enquiry, from the object xiv

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right up to the planned society itself. The researches for this book taught me much more than my observations could ever have done. But I also learnt much from my years of first-hand experience of post-Wall eastern Germany which I would never have found in the archives.

Acknowledgements

I shall avoid the standard academic ritual of gratitude, with the debts to professors, archivists, award givers and finally the dedication to the inevitably long-suffering family. Spike Milligan, on receiving a lifetime achievement award for comedy in 1996, announced with wicked candour: ‘I’m not going to thank anybody, because I did it all on my own!’ Indeed, I too did this work all on my own. But I also empathize with Robert Blatchford, author of the 1893 Merrie England, who felt obliged to thank everyone who had made him who he was: ‘Who taught me to read, and to write? Who suckled me, nursed me, clothed me, fed me, cured me of my fevers and other ailings. Where did I get my ideas from, my thoughts, my power, such as it is, of literary arrangement, form and style . . . What do I owe to personal friends; to schoolmasters, to the people I have rubbed shoulders and touched hands with all these years . . . I can only tell you that these people have made me what I am and have taught me all I know.’ With apologies in advance for any oversights and a modest concession to hierarchy: first-rank thanks go to my brilliant professors and mentors at the Royal College of Art in London, Jeremy Aynsley and David Crowley and to my comrade scholar Torsten Lange. Equally high-ranking thanks go to my generous and intellectually stimulating family, Peter Blodau, Roberta Jenkins, Jane and Joe Quincey, Jolyon, Victoria and Lucy Jenkins. The former GDR citizens and experts I interviewed for this book were sincere, creative and interesting, and are included in the list of the following people whom for a whole range of reasons I wish to thank: Günter Babst, Rebecca Barden, Mtanous el Beik, Fernando Bellon, Axel Bertram, Mathias Bertram, Peter Biernath, Esther Blodau, Gerhard Bondzin, Friedrun Bondzin, Lutz Brandt, Edwige Braun, Philippe Braun, Paul Brühwiler, Harald Brünig, Bridget Collins, Claire Collins, Jim Cooper, Tom Cubbin, Olivia Davies, Jürgen Deutler, Alison Dexter, Reinhardt Dietrich, Tim Donaldson, Ilse Maria Dorfstecher, April Eisman, Erich Enge Inge Götze, Kholoud Khaled Essawy, Sigbert Fliegel, Bruno Flierl, Eva Ruiz de Guana, Ruth Heholt, Alice HollandBywaters, Martin Hubbard, Polly Hunter, Ian Jenkins, Amanda Jory, Ben Kaden, Dunja Karcher, Christine Kern, Wolfgang Kil, Antje Kirsch, Kirsten Kohfahl, Gwendolyn Kulick, Caroline Labusch, Elvira Lätsch, John Law, Andreas Ludwig, xvi

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Sara Marzouk, Martin Maleschka, John Manning, Ingrid Müller-Kuberski Willi Neubert, Ronald Paris, Angela Partington, Adrian Peach, Gail Perkins, Angelika Petruschiat, Kate Pool, David Prior, Isabel Prugger, Ingeborg Rappoport, Eva Reid, Anonymous Peer Reviewers, Susan Richter, Lisa Rose, Quim Rosell, Linda Sandino, Martin Schmidt, Helene Schmidt, Robin Schuldenfrei, Florian Seidel, Vlatka Semeret, Shahdan Sherif, Brigitte Sieger, Kurt Heinz Sieger, Sally Skerret, Martina Stark Erika Stürmer-Alex, John Tarver, Manfred Otto Taubert, Iain Thompson, Alice Twemlow, Sophie Twiss, Florian Urban, Manfred Vollmert, Rolf Walter, John L. Walters, Jim Waters, Jo Walton, Jane Watt, Nicola Webb, Ines Weizman, Gerhard Wenzel, Lesley Whitworth, Beth Williamson, Sylke Wunderlich and Peter Zimmermann. The PhD research on which this book is based was enabled through a studentship award from the AHRC. The RCA funded a student bursary. The Design History Society and German History Society made a number of research grants available. Falmouth University financially supported the completion of the book. All of this funding kept the work going and reinforced the sense of responsibility I have in putting my findings into the public domain.

Glossary and Abbreviations

Terms Architektur Nationaler Tradition Architecture of national tradition. Socialist realist style or method of building which sought to appropriate national traditions in the respective country in which it was practised. Bezirk An administrative district. Fourteen districts were created in the GDR in 1952 in place of the traditional Länder or regions. Bitterfelder Weg Bitterfield Way. A programme set up based on two conferences held at Bitterfeld on 24 April 1959 and 24–25 April 1964. The intention was to bring artists and writers to work in close collaboration with manual workers. The cultural political dictionary of the GDR states that the aim was both to ‘deepen the cultural movement of the working class’ and to ‘orientate socialist artists to the artistic creations of the present mainly through changing their way of life, and their direct participation in the work and life of working people in factories and collectives’.1 Artist and writers were also responsible for encouraging the creative work of lay people through amateur art circles.

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BRD FRG Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) formed in May 1949. DDR GDR German Democratic Republic (East Germany) founded in October 1949. Komplexe Umweltgestaltung Complex Environmental Design. Theory and practice for the design of the built environment developed in the 1960s and partially implemented in the 1970s and 1980s. Neues Bauen New Building. The late 1920s European movement for Modernist architectural developments based on rational principles of economy and functionality, aligned to Neue Sachlichkeit in the arts. In Germany the centre for the movement thrived in social democratic administrations, for example Ernst May as city architect in Frankfurt am Main. Other examples are Walter Gropius’s 1926 Dessau-Törten estate and Bruno Taut’s 1929 Carl-Legien estate in Berlin. Wohnkomplex (WK) Living Complex (LK). A planned residential area comprising multiple housing blocks, with an infrastructure for daily needs. It was not intended as an overspill but as an independent urban entity with connections to a main city or centre.2

Kulturpolitisches Wörtebuch (Berlin: Dietz, 1978), 111–12. The idea of the Living Complex was introduced by Kurt Junghanns (Der Wohnkomplex als Planungselement im Staedtebau, Henschel Verlag, 1954) and developed by Hans Schmidt, ‘Der sozialistische Wohnkomplex als Architektur’ (Deutsche Architektur, 8, 1958).

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Glossary and Abbreviations

Institutions and organizations Names were changed after 1973 in recognition of the separate states of the two Germanys. AdK Akademie der Künste Academy of the Arts. Institution for support and development of the arts. BdA Bund deutscher Architekten The Association or Union of German architects, renamed BdA/DDR after 1973. DBA Deutsche Bauakademie German Building Academy. Central research institute for construction, renamed Bauakademie der DDR after 1973. In this text: Bauakademie. Institut für Angewandte Kunst Institute for Applied Arts, Berlin, 1952–63. Research institute for applied arts. The organization went through a number of changes, in name, administration and emphasis, representing a politically significant and gradual shift from craft to design and from arts to industry. ISA Institut für Städtebau und Architektur Institute for Town Planning and Architecture. Research institute at the Bauakademie. VBKD Verband Bildende Künstler Deutschlands The Association or Union of GDR artists, designers and craftspeople which absorbed independent artists’ associations in 1950, when the GDR was founded. Renamed VBK-DDR after 1970. ZAG Zentrale Arbeitsgruppe der BdA/ DDR und VbK/DDR The central working group of the architects’ and Artists’ Unions, formed in 1968 to improve the theory and quality of architectural art. Zentralinstitut für Formgestaltung Institute for Design, which replaced the above in 1963 with greater focus on design. From 1972 to 1990 Amt für

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Industrielle Formgestaltung (AiF), Office for Industrial Design.

Political bodies BL-SED Bezirksleitung SED The district SED leadership. KPD Kommunistisches Partei Deutschlands The German communist party before it was merged with the Social Democratic Party to create the SED in 1946. Politbüro The highest decision-making committee, part of the ZK. SED Sozialistisches Einheitspartei Socialist Unity Party. The ruling socialist party in the GDR. ZK Zentralkommittee der SED Central Committee of the SED.

Publications bk bildende kunst (bk) East German art periodical for painting, graphics, sculpture and architecture, published in the Soviet Occupied Zone (1947–9), relaunched as Bildende Kunst (BK) for painting, sculpture, graphics, book art, applied art and craft (VBKD/ VBK-DDR 1953–91). DA Deutsche Architektur East German architecture periodical, renamed Architektur der DDR (ArchDDR) in 1973. Farbe und Raum East German decorators’ and colourists’ trade magazine. Form und Zweck / form+zweck (after 1965/2) East German industrial design periodical. Neue Werbung New Advertising. East German advertising periodical, published by the national advertising agency, DEWAG. ND Neues Deutschland The official newspaper of the ruling SED.

BALTIC SEA

Rügen Rostock FACHSCHULE HEILIGENDAMM APPLIED ARTS COLLEGE

Schwerin

Neubrandenburg

GDR

Schwedt

GERMAN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC 1949–1990

PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF POLAND EAST BERLIN SCHOOL OF ART AND DESIGN

FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY

Brandenburg

BERLIN WEISSENSEE WEST EAST

Frankfurt

Potsdam

Eisenhüttenstadt (Stalinstadt)

Magdeburg

STEEL WORKS EISENHÜTTENKOMBINAT

Dessau

FORMER BAUHAUS

THALE STEELWORKS

Halle-Neustadt CHEMISTRY INDUSTRY

Halle

Hoyerswerda SCHOOL FOR ART BOOK AND GRAPHICS

Leipzig SCHOOL FOR ARCHITECTURE AND CONSTRUCTION (HAB)

Erfurt

Cottbus

BURG GIEBICHENSTEIN DESIGN SCHOOL

Weimar

FORMER BAUHAUS

BROWN COAL WORKS SCHWARZE PUMPE

Dresden ACADEMY OF ART AND DESIGN

Jena Gera

Karl Marx Stadt (Chemnitz)

Suhl PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF CZECHOSLOVAKIA

Map of GDR. © J. R. Jenkins.

xx

Introduction

Nobody much cared about the works of art which remained unhelpfully in the urban environment after German reunification. Paintings could be removed to storage in museum cellars, but public art remained stubbornly in place. Some works, such as a Karl Marx relief on the entrance to Leipzig University, generated local controversy and were eventually removed from public view. Gert Bondzin’s monumental Der Weg der Roten Fahne (The Path of the Red Flag) (Figures 0.1 and 0.2) on the Dresden Kulturpalast was draped with a grey veil. Willi Neubert’s enamel frieze Die Presse (The Press) at Berlin Alexanderplatz disappeared behind the cladding of a steak house. Most interior works landed in builders’ skips or gradually disintegrated. Weeds grew over sculptures. Fountains ran dry. Ceramics were smashed. Tiles fell off mosaics. That was the picture for most of the 1990s. By the year 2000, a few local authorities and other organizations came up with imaginative ways of dealing with such works. Lev Kerbel’s colossal Karl Marx bust at the centre of Chemnitz (formerly Karl Marx Stadt) was enclosed in a white box by artists and then reappeared on a credit card. A panel of an enamel mural from Suhl by Willi Sitte was embedded on the facade of a new museum devoted to the artist in Merseberg. The private DDR Museum in Berlin took custody of Ronald Paris’s mural from the Haus der Statistik on Alexanderplatz, relocating it to their visitor cafe. Artists could only be grateful that their work had found a new existence. But the last ten years, as the German Democratic Republic (GDR) is firmly lodged as history, has seen a wider public and scholarly interest in East Germany’s architectural art and, in some cases, funds have been found for complete restorations.1 The declining visibility and disastrous condition of the remaining works in public space2 also galvanized their re-evaluation since around 2010, not 1

In 2020-21 ‘Seventy years of public art in Germany’ (both East and West) is marked by the Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning (BBR) with a symposium, documentation and a new touring exhibition. 2 Where works have fallen victim to vandalism or been dispensed with in reconstruction programmes, this amounts to a municipal statement of negative value, given that vandalism of present-day art or monuments would normally be dealt with.

1

2

Picturing Socialism

so much as works of art but as markers of place and identity. For example, a renovation project costing around Euro 800,000 completed in 20193 of Josep Renau’s Die Beziehung des Menschen zu Natur und Technik (The Relationship of People to Nature and Technology; 1980–4) was medialized largely as an event for the people of Erfurt, as a marker of place and home or ‘heimat’ and as part of the physical profile of the city, even though the dramatic impact and compelling story of the work attracted international interest, pointing to potential world heritage significance of some GDR architectural art ensembles.4 With plenty of caveats about the ideological circumstances of production, some works and architectural ensembles are now accepted as heritage at a local level, as part of the profile of towns and of potential interest to tourists. But in spite of this reappraisal, little has been written on the history or artistic value of public art in East Germany. Although in heritage terms works have been assigned value as ‘documents’, there is little discourse around what is being documented. Cultural heritage needs to be understood in terms of how social and ideological reproduction occurs through spaces, forms, materials, narratives, iconography and rituals. The integration of works of art within architecture in the GDR was not just intended to cheer up a

Figure 0.1 Detail of Gerhard Bondzin, ‘Der Weg der Roten Fahne’ on the Kulturpalast (Palace of Culture), Dresden, 1969. Photograph © J.R.Jenkins 2019.

3

The mural, now property of the town of Erfurt, was not recognized for preservation until 2008. ‘Wandmosaik von Josep Renau kehrt nach Erfurt zurück.’ Erfurt.de. 09.12.2019. https://www.erfurt. de/ef/de/service/aktuelles/am/2019/134080.html#slot_100_2 4

Introduction

3

Figure 0.2 Kulturpalast (Palace of Culture), architectural collectives Leopold Wiel and Mural: Gerhard Bondzin, ‘Der Weg der Roten Fahne’, 1969. Photograph Dresden © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Manfred Thonig.

triste landscape, it was at the very heart of the self-understanding of the socialist state. For those involved in shaping the GDR, it seemed from start to finish that the built environment and its art was critical to the success of socialism. Picturing Socialism, the first history of East German public art in the English language, seeks not to close a gap in research, but to open up this fascinating field. It makes visible, values and evaluates some of the immense variety and qualities of the works of fine art, crafts and design integrated in the built environment from 1945 to 1990. It analyses the critical discourse which assured the place of these works as an integral part of architectural ensembles across the realist, Modernist and potentially postmodernist eras, and it interprets their didactic and decorative functions. The central argument of this book is that the visual arts in architecture and public space were critical for denoting socialist difference, a crucial endeavour in East Germany, which sought to develop a distinct socialist culture at the same time as competing with its western neighbour, the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). Socialist difference hinged on establishing a culture and landscape which did not look like a poorer version of the West, but which was a demonstrably socialist social and aesthetic system. This system was socialist realism, established in the Soviet Union since the 1930s and imported into all the newly socialist Eastern European states soon after the start of the Cold War in 1947. Socialist realism contested the idea of the autonomy of the artist or of art, insisting that they

4

Picturing Socialism

must be ideological, close to the people, close to the Party, and representative of ‘typical’ life. But by 1954 the cultural polarity through which the fronts of the Cold War had been established was disrupted by the Soviet change in course, with most socialist states then reneging on socialist realism and developing their own forms of Modernism. East Germany differed. Whilst standardized building was favoured by Khruschev as economical, Modernism as a cultural practice remained off-limits for the GDR political leadership whilst holding a magnetism for many practitioners. This book argues that the polydisciplinary field of the visual arts in the built environment allowed for transitions between competing visions of what socialist architecture and public art should be. Over four decades, the centrality of art in the built environment enabled the development from the realist conception of architecture as an art form (Baukunst) to a conception of Complex Environmental Design (Komplexe Umweltgestaltung). As the emphasis in urban planning shifted to integrated environmental conceptions of public space in the 1970s – a shift to design – the role for art continued to be defended by anti-functionalists and others concerned about monotony, particularly of standardized housing. This critical position of art as a signifying practice within standardized architecture resulted in the production of prodigious numbers of works of great variety, many of which exhibit an interesting hybrid quality of the socialist realist method and modern language of form. The critical importance of art and architecture as signifiers of socialism resulted in protracted ideological struggles, but these were not just between practitioners and so-called ‘Party ideologues’ – a term frequently used in GDR scholarship to suggest a kind of irrational attachment to ideology – but often between influential artists, architects and critics who held differing views on how to adapt to societal and technological change whilst developing socialist culture. The power of the authorities was in its ability to censure, conceal or to sanction. But these were braking mechanisms, not idea-generating mechanisms. The episodes of heavy censure, most notoriously in so-called formalism debates (in 1951 and again in 1962–4), which denigrated works with any hint of an abstracting aesthetic, provided no answers, no guidelines, other than looking towards the Soviet Union. In the words of Horst Strempel, whose Friedrichstrasse station mural was at the centre of the 1951 debate, the attitude of Party functionaries was: ‘We know nothing about art, but we will criticise.’5 At the same time, leadership of the ruling

5

Discussion at the School of Art Weissensee on the article by N. Orlow in the Tägliche Rundschau, 20 and 21 January 1951. Professor Strempel was paraphrasing comments made by a delegation of Party functionaries dispatched to assess a mural he had painted in Ballenstadt. Strempel claimed that the workers had no problems with the mural, except some did not like the form. ‘Besprechung am 26.01.52 über die Artikel von Orlow in der “Täglichen Rundschau” ’, in Hildtrud Ebert, Drei Kapitel Weissensee: Dokumente zur Geschichte der Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weissensee, 1946 bis 1957 (Berlin: Lukas Verlag, 1996), 150–6, 155.

Introduction

5

Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED), whilst periodically flexing its muscles and redrawing the boundaries of political virtue, was well aware that it depended on its artists and intelligentsia to substantiate its ideals. Picturing Socialism employs a chronological and geographical framework to reveal how as well as tensions and disagreement there was also innovation and progress. It travels from Eisenhüttenstadt, Dresden, Berlin and Hoyerswerda in the 1950s, to the debates at the German Building Academy in Berlin and the new socialist landscape of Halle-Neustadt in the 1960s, to the design collective for the East Berlin World Festival Games in 1973, and ends in a form of postmodernism in Rostock in the 1980s. The title Picturing Socialism invokes both the process of developing and defining visual representations which contributed to a ‘socialist imaginary’, as well as their production and situation within the public built environment. The positivist idea pursued in socialist realism that visual or literary texts and artefacts could reflect reality (albeit in a solely affirmative fashion), and thereby communicate ideology and generate predictable responses, could not be contained. The ‘social imaginary’ (Castoriadis)6 in which the creative and symbolic dimension of the social world is created is exactly what is meant by ‘picturing’ socialism. Socialism was ‘pictured’ in multiple ways, for many through the historical experience of Weimar Modernism, but also through German traditions, revolutionary art, Mexican muralism, and social and intellectual developments outside the Eastern bloc after 1949. ‘Picturing’ also describes a more prosaic reality of filling public spaces with art with the expectation of transferring ideals to the people who inhabit them. This is certainly the intention of terms used by the architectural critic Bruno Flierl, the verb bebildern and noun Bekunstung, who argued that covering buildings with pictures or art deflected from the opportunity to create a reformed, social conception of socialist architecture.7

History and parameters of public art in the GDR: An overview Public art was ubiquitous in the GDR. It was important in bringing the communicative power of art out of the realm of galleries and collectors and into the shared spaces of public life. A lateral function was the colour, orientation and variety which it offered within the built environment. Whilst a public art programme existed in West Germany too, this did not match the scope or ideological

6

Cornelius Castoriadis, L’institution imaginaire de la société (Paris: Seuil, 1975), cited in Studies in the Theory of Ideology, J. B. Thompson (Cambridge: Polity, 1984), 23. 7 Bruno Flierl, ‘Architektur im Prozeß komplexer Umweltgestaltung’, Architektur und bildende Kunst, Komplexe Stadtgestaltung, Publication of ZAG Seminar, Erfurt 1981 (Berlin: BdA DDR), 12.

6

Picturing Socialism

significance of public art in the GDR. In 1988, even after budgets for public art had been drastically cut, there were over 3,000 submissions to the X. Art Exhibition in Dresden from across the republic.8 The vast majority of public art in the GDR was only known in situ by those who lived and worked in its town centres, housing estates, shops and precincts, canteens and factories, nurseries, playgrounds, schools and universities, political and administrative buildings, health, cultural and sports facilities, hotels, ministries, municipal and trade union buildings. Works of architectural art were also given a national platform at the the Dresden art exhibitions, which attracted high visitor numbers and interest from the general public.9 But the intense debates over architectural art were largely discourses internal to the GDR and did not feature in the Cold War rivalries played out through exponents of modernity such as prestige architecture, sport, technology and consumer goods. The changing terminology for the genre reflected disputes over the proper socialist course of art and architecture. In the 1940s and early 1950s Kunst am Bau (art on buildings), was used, a term retained in West Germany and reinstated in post-unification Germany. In the socialist realist architecture of the GDR from post-1945 to the mid-1950s, the integration of pictorial elements into the substance of buildings was carried forth from earlier traditions. Simple figures of, for example, working people, farmers, and activities such as music making and reading replaced classical allegories; socialist symbols were integrated into decorative elements; purely ornamental work, geometric and plant-inspired was also common. Techniques in which established artists and craftspeople were already expert such as stone relief, ceramic relief, painted ceramic and sgraffito, and bronze for sculptures also represented a continuity of tradition. The term Wandbild (mural) could refer to methods which were more applied than traditional painting and frescoes, such as ceramic tiling, reliefs in stone, plaster, brick, or other materials, Bleiintarsie (lead intaglio) and mosaics. The major shift in architectural art came in the 1960s. This was due to several influences, most importantly the drive to ‘industrialize’ building – in other words, to create prototypes for buildings, especially housing but also schools, nurseries and other functions, which could be serially, and thus economically, reproduced. This came alongside what was termed the ‘scientific-technical revolution’

8

Rolf Walter, ‘Zur Entwicklung der architekturbezogene Kunst seit der IX Kunstausstellung der DDR 1982/83’, in Architektur und bildende Kunst 10 (Berlin VBK-DDR, 1988), 77. 9 Visitor numbers and comments in guest books were recorded and officially analysed. The data for 1988 shows that 78 per cent of visitors were reasonably to very interested in the genre, slightly higher than the figures for industrial design and craft. Zentralarchiv für empirische Sozialforschung an der Universität zu Köln, cited in Bjorn Raupach, ‘Gewebte Lebensfreude’, PhD Dissertation (Paderborn: University of Paderborn, 2016), 106.

Introduction

7

(Wissenschaftlich-technischen Revolution or WTR).10 In the fields of design and architecture, the drive towards synthetics in industry and the economic advantages of concrete module-based building demanded a rethink of the usefulness of ‘national style’. Modernity for the consumer would be supported with a new vision of beauty through colourful plastic goods, as announced by Walter Ulbricht at the 1958 chemistry conference. For architectural art this was a boom time, not only because the new building types benefited all the more from differentiation and inscription, but also because artists and designers embraced the possibility to innovate with new techniques and materials. This period inspired new visual representations for science and space travel, and from the mid-1960s new styles and media also became acceptable. Walter Ulbricht declared that the ‘socialist person’ was considered to have reached greater cultural maturity and thus able to comprehend more complex forms of art.11 For the applied arts, the embrace of serialization could have spelt the end of the usefulness of the hand-made artefact, the German traditions of which had been valorized in the early 1950s by Walter Heisig at the Institute for Applied Arts and its journal Form und Zweck. In fact, the separation of applied arts and design after 1958 (in the Artists’ Union, collections and educational institutions) led to an increased validity of applied arts in what became baubezogene Kunst (building-related art) or architekturbezogene Kunst (architecture-related art). Stained glass, abstract works in wood, ceramics, metal, glass, tapestry and textiles proliferated both within and independently from the built structure. New residential zones built using standardized elements also raised the popularity of geometric modular structures, spatial dividers and facades, fountains and play apparatus as works of public art and design. This book makes the case that there was a hybrid Modernist/socialist realist discourse in East German architecture, an argument which can be introduced with the example of the 1964 curtain wall building, Haus des Lehrers (House of Teachers) by architect Hermann Henselmann on Alexanderplatz in Berlin (Figure 0.3). The 120-metre frieze by Walter Womacka, which wraps like a band around all four sides of the building, plays an essential role in reaffirming and making visible the socialist realist credentials of the whole ensemble. On the south-facing section of the mural

10 The ‘scientific-technological revolution’ was declared the fourth productive power in 1964 after capital, labour and land. At the Seventh Party Congress in April 1967, Walter Ulbricht declared its realization as the fundamental task of the GDR. The term remained in use through to the end of the GDR, though it became largely rhetorical. 11 As a result of the scientific revolution, and the higher level of educational attainment, people were ready for more sophisticated art. In November 1967, a Politbüro resolution stated that as a consequence of the ‘unprecedented boost in intellectual life and the scientific technical revolution – including the field of ideology, spiritual and cultural life’, there was a much higher intellectual and aesthetic awareness, which required ‘new forms to satisfy the ever increasing aesthetic needs’. It was the task of artists to meet this higher educational and aesthetic level. ‘Die Aufgaben der Kultur bei der Entwicklung der sozialistischen Menschengemeinschaft’, 30.11.1967, cited in Elimar Schubbe, Dokumente zur Kunst, Literatur- und Kulturpolitik der SED (Stuttgart: Seewald, 1972), 1310–15, 1311.

8

Picturing Socialism

is depicted the principle of the Bitterfelder Weg – the programme by which artists were to work directly with factory workers within their working spaces; this was the realization of ‘democratic art’.12 Womacka depicts the artist, in dialogue with the factory workers, painting a face which echoes Picasso’s 1962 Woman in a Hat (Figure 0.4). In spite of his socialist credentials, Picasso had been defamed by the GDR authoriies in the formalism debate of the early 1950s. Womacka, a committed socialist realist artist with close ties to the Party leadership, employed a Picassoesque language to illustrate the ‘closeness to the people’ principle on a building which takes its inspiration from the post-war international modern. Nonetheless, Henselmann may have imagined something more in a Corbusian spirit of ‘polychrome murals that will dynamite the wall’13 to grace his architecture: The picture wall should not be like a monument. It should be made of similar light materials. As part of the curtain wall it should hang something like a curtain, like a veil. An audacious, even overly bold, in any case, bright arabesque which brings something feminine to the rather masculine, mathematically built high rise.14

Figure 0.3 Haus des Lehrers (House of Teachers), Hermann Henselmann. Mural: Walter Womacka, 1965. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Andrea Ulbricht. 12

See Glossary. Le Corbusier ‘Peinture, Sculpture et architecture rationaliste’, Volta, 1936, cited in R. Golan, ‘From Monument to Muralnomad: The mural in modern European Architecture’ 186–209 in Karen Koehler and Christy Anderson (eds), The Built Surface, Vol. 2 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002), 194. 14 Hermann Henselmann. DA, 8/61, 443. 13

Introduction

9

Figure 0.4 Detail of Walter Womacka, ‘Unser Leben’ on Haus des Lehrers, 1964. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019.

So, a building for teachers at the heart of the city and at the entrance to Karl Marx Allee speaks the language of international Modernism but depicts realist vignettes of joyful socialist life, which at a distance acts as the shimmering horizontal band of light and colour countering the economy of the elemental forms that comprise the whole ensemble. In Henselmann’s gendered conception, the expressive image becomes the ‘feminine’ countering the technological ‘masculine’. The Haus des Lehrers and its mosaic were held up by art critic, Ullrich Kuhirt in the journal Bildende Kunst as a way forward for the socialist realist mural, as ‘simultaneous decoration and message’, which showed ‘everything worth defending in Socialism’.15 Kuhirt’s text was a reassertion of the role for art in architecture in the mid-1960s, and an explicit rejection of the separation of the two art forms. The twentieth anniversary celebrations of the foundation of the GDR in 1969 were marked with a major exhibition in Berlin, ‘Architecture and Art’ alongside district exhibitions (Figure 0.5).16 These exhibitions marked the apex (and it turned out, the end) of the tenure of Walter Ulbricht as First Secretary of the SED: the re-forming of town centres in the image of Modernism and, importantly, the choreography of art within them gave form to Ulbricht’s vision for a modernized East German state.

15

Ullrich Kuhirt, ‘Schmuck und Aussage Zugleich’, in BK 10/1964, 510–17. Altes Museum, Berlin, October 1969–January 1970.

16

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Picturing Socialism

Figure 0.5 Suhl, city centre, model, 1969. Photograph Berlin © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Asmus Steuerlein.

Erich Honecker, who succeeded Walter Ulbricht as First Secretary of the SED from 1971, shifted investment from the city centres to the mass-production of housing. He liberalized arts policy, allowing for a broader range of subject matter and artistic means (known as ‘breadth and variety’).17 Although the didactic quality of socialist realist art was weakened, the principle that art was to be appreciated by working people remained. Through the work of social scientists and architectural theorists such as Fred Staufenbiel and Bruno Flierl, the concept of Complex Environmental Design (Komplexe Umweltgestaltung) was established, although not fully realized due both to logistical limitations and ideological opposition for reasons of its implicit suggestion of decentralization of power. The planning of large-scale modularized urban complexes saw the development of functional design elements such as lighting, information design and street furniture alongside works of art. This integration of a range of artistic and social and scientific disciplines in Complex Environmental Design represented the move towards a more socially defined socialist built environment.

17 The policy course described as Weite und Vielfalt or ‘breadth and variety’ for the arts was announced by Erich Honecker at the VIII Party Congress of the SED (15–19 June, 1971).

Introduction

11

One of the ongoing problems in achieving a successful synthesis of art and architecture was the deficit of cooperative conditions between artists and architecture. This was partly logistical but also due to the fact that the production of architecture as an industrial product had separated the professions of artist and architecture. In the absence of an integrated creative process, there was a tendency for works of art to be additive rather than integral. In the 1970s there were attempts to change this by including artists at the planning stage of complex residential ensembles, such as for the huge residential complex in Marzahn outside Berlin from 1974. Still, the expectation was that ‘socialist realist works of art’ would encourage ‘socialist living behaviour’ with their ‘depth of content’ rather than ‘superficiality . . . and effects’.18 By contrast, guidelines from the architects’ association for the development of urbanism and architecture in 1980 assigned art a much more pedestrian function. Art was means of ‘adding colour and ideological content’, with ‘functional, imaginative solutions’ in the places where people spend time.19 In the 1980s, ideas on a proper course for the visual arts in the built environment diverged further. This diversity mirrored postmodernist fragmentation experienced in other post-industrial societies and whilst liberalization lifted certain cultural taboos, such as on the Bauhaus, it also deepened the cleft between theoretical and idealized positions and the political-economic reality.

The place of architectural art in post-1990 scholarship and history making The politically charged historicization of East German art since 1990 has seen three main phases: first, an establishment reckoning with the GDR as political entity; secondly, attempts to fend off the resultant wave of Ostalgie;20 and thirdly, a partial though uneven rehabilitation of some aspects of the GDR past which could be absorbed within acceptable unifying myths.21

18 ‘Konzeption für die künstlerische Konzeption von Wohnkomplexen in Berlin’, Draft, 07.11.1974, Box 300, DDR Collections, GRI, LA, 4. 19 BdA and Bauakademie, ‘Leitlinien für die Entwicklung für die Städtebau und Architektur in den 80er Jahr’, Draft, 06.1980, Box 300, DDR Collections, GRI, 13. 20 The popular phenomenon of nostalgia for the GDR which emerged in the late 1990s – a neologism of East and nostalgia. 21 J. R. Jenkins ‘As good as apple pie? Post-unification Germany and the reception of public art from the former German Democratic Republic’, in Design, History and Time (London: Bloomsbury, 2019), 51–63; April Eisman, Bernhard Heisig and the Fight for Modern Art in East Germany (New York: Camden House, 2018), 183–5.

12

Picturing Socialism

The first phase, the ‘reckoning’, saw East German literature and fine art mired in bitter controversy in a long-running Bilderstreit (argument about art). East German artists were dismissed as non-artists – in the words of George Baselitz in June 1990, ‘none of them ever painted a picture’22 – and if the April 1990 cover of the West German magazine Arch+ was to be believed, there were no architects either.23 Architectural art undoubtedly fell into the category of ‘state art’ or ‘propaganda art’ in such mindsets because it was always subject to the commissioning process. Arguably public art in general occupies a lowly position in the hierarchy of arts due its lack of autonomy, its subjugation to architecture and its surroundings, and its frequent tendency to the decorative: East German public art was largely ignored, whilst at the same time a huge amount of energy was spent in the 1990s discrediting East German art more generally. There is nonetheless a single important work on GDR architectural art post-1990, the German monograph Wände der Verheissung24 (Walls of Promises) by Leipzig architectural critic Peter Guth (1953–2004). His book gives a detailed, almost encyclopaedic account of developments in East German architectural art from 1945 to 1990 with an extended section on the final months of the socialist state drawn from Guth’s own archives. It reads as a lament on both the failures of socialism and its public art, but at the same time is charged with a desire to preserve its legacy, reflecting an ambivalence between loss and anger not untypical amongst intellectuals in the post-1990 period. Recent preservationist interest in GDR public art within Germany has seen some scholarship grounded in heritage and evaluation. Kunstvolle Oberflächen des Sozialismus (Artistic Surfaces of Socialism) investigates four forms of public art in the GDR. Walter Womacka’s forty-year oeuvre is charted as a series of loyal responses to SED culture politics, which it is claimed ultimately ran out of optimism and ideas.25 Schiefelbein and Tschierschky are credited for their artistic innovation in the genre of modular design which proliferated in the GDR. This research is valuable for the insights on the potential modes of heritage evaluation (which it generally concludes to be historical rather than artistic). The publication itself demonstrates the value to our perception of such work when presented

22

’Keine Künstler, keine Maler, keiner von denen hat je ein Bild gemalt’ in ‘Ein Meister, der Talent verschmäht’. Interview with Axel Hecht and Alfred Welti with Georg Baselitz, ART, Das Kunstmagazin, Issue 6 (Hamburg, 1990), 70. 23 The cover title of the April 1990 issue was ‘Architecture without Architects’, ARCH+ 103: ‘Architektur ohne Architekten’ (Berlin: April 1990). 24 Peter Guth, Wände der Verheissung: Zur Geschichte der architekturbezogenen Kunst in der DDR (Leipzig: Thom Verlag, 1995). 25 Luise Helas, Wilma Rambow and Felix Rössl, Kunstvolle Oberflächen des Sozialismus: Wandbilder und Betonformsteine (Weimar: Bauhaus-Universitätsverlag Weimar, 2014).

Introduction

13

through contemporary graphic design and high-quality imagery. This observation is made by Natascha Meuser in a teaching project which looked at how GDR public art can be reassessed and publicly presented. ‘[Good quality images] do not solely support documentation, but also convey the aesthetic qualities of the artwork described and make a contribution themselves to criticism and contextualisation.’26 Antje Kirsch’s scholarly and educational activities focused on the group PG Kunst+Bau and public art in Dresden also lends this value.27 Oliver Sukrow, for example in his study of Spanish émigré Josep Renau,28 embeds the works of art and architecture within the utopian and technological imaginary of scientific technological revolution. To get a more general understanding of the literature and heritage making through media, scholarship and exhibitions post-1990, we must turn to the dual trajectories of the reception of GDR art and architecture, and in particular, socialist realism and Modernism. A key motif developed in the literature and public history of the 1990s was the suppression in the GDR of Modernist art in favour of socialist realism, perpetuated by exhibitions such as Aufsteig und Fall der Moderne (Rise and Fall of Modernism) in Weimar in 1999. This did not only implicate the GDR in the ‘fall’ of Modernism but made explicit ideas that had been circulating for years – an equivalence between the art of the Third Reich and that of the GDR.29 In such crude manifestations, a victors’ agenda was clear. However, the narrative of the inhibition of a Modernist revival by the cultural authorities is an important one for this book, to which we will return. Another assumption underlying the caricature of ‘state art’ and ‘state artists’ is that agents of culture such as artists and architects were either fulfilling the demands of Party authorities or working to circumvent them; in both scenarios practitioners and authorities are viewed as separate entities. David Bathrick has noted the extent to which ‘dissident’ writers were culturally absorbed in the GDR,30 and as Picturing Socialism seeks to demonstrate, both reform-minded and conservative intellectuals and artists were active in developing socialist culture. Further, accounts of architectural and artistic development in the GDR, which portray

26 N. Meuser, Architecture-related Artworks in Dessau, Interior Architecture, Vol. 11 (Dessau: Anhalt University of Applied Sciences, 2018), 11. Research project for the MA in Monumental Heritage, Winter Semester 2017/2018. 27 A. Kirsch, Dresden – Kunst im Stadtraum, Architekturbezogene Kunst 1945–1989 (Dresden: SaxoPhon, 2015.) 28 See for example, Oliver Sukrow, Arbeit. Wohnen. Computer. Zur Utopie in der bildenden Kunst und Architektur der DDR in den 1960er Jahren, 14 Dec 2018, DOI:10.17885/heiup.422.613 29 Rolf Bothe and Thomas Föhl, Aufstieg und Fall der Moderne (Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz, 1999); Kristina Bauer-Volke, ‘Aufstieg und Fall – Der Eklat in Weimar. DDR-Kunst im Nachwende-Deutschland’ Bd. 27 Nr. 3 kritische berichte (Ilmtal-Weinstraße: Jonas, 1999). 30 David Bathrick, The Powers of Speech: The Politics of Culture in the GDR (Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 1995).

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change as a direct consequence of political decisions, produce a misleading picture. As early as 1985 this kind of determinism was questioned in relation to the Soviet Union. Victor Paperny’s Architecture in the Age of Stalin: Culture Two rejects the idea that aesthetic features of Stalinist architecture resulted from decisions made by Stalin and the Party; Paperny proposes a historical cycle in Russia alternating between avant-gardism and realism. In The Total Art of Stalinism, Boris Groys eschews the recounting of infrastructural events as ‘only a façade concealing real social processes, even if the apparatus outwardly claims that its decisions are of crucial significance to such processes’.31 In both arguments, there is a case made for a social-cultural dynamic propelling events, rather than a cause and effect from political resolutions to artistic response.

Reclaiming Modernism in the wake of the Bilderstreit By the year 2000, the complexity of cultural change in the GDR was more widely acknowledged and research interest shifted to looking at how forms of Modernism in urbanism, architecture, and design and fine arts ‘overcame’ socialist realism. Ulrike Goeschen’s seminal Vom Sozialistischen Realismus zur Kunst im Sozialismus32 traces how East German artists and critics were able to innovate beyond 1950s socialist realism through the use of acceptable terminology. The painter Hermann Raum tells the story from the inside as one who refuted the art politics of the SED at a critical Fifth Congress of the Artists’ Union in 1964. Raum suggests that ‘the Cold War ideologized art on both sides, but those artists who argued with the culture policy in the DDR were often loyal communists’.33 In architectural research too there was a concerted effort to identify the significance of Modernism in the East from around 2004. A wave of activities and publications sought to define and defend what became known as the Ostmoderne (East Modernism), shoehorning GDR architects into the canon of architectural Modernism.34 Nonetheless, Butter and Hartung warned of the limitations and

31 Boris Groys, The Total Art of Stalinism: Avant-garde, Aesthetic, Dictatorship, and Beyond (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 12–13. 32 Ulrike Goeschen, Vom Sozialistischen Realismus zur Kunst im Sozialismus: Die Rezeption der Moderne in Kunst und Kunstwissenschaft der DDR (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2001). 33 Hermann Raum, Bildende Kunst in der DDR: Die andere Moderne (Edition Ost: Berlin, 2000). 34 Andreas Butter and Ulrich Hartung, Ostmoderne: Architektur in Berlin 1945–1965 (Berlin: Jovis, 2004); Thomas Flierl, List und Schicksal der Ost-Moderne (Berlin: form+zweck, 2008); Wolfgang Kil, Wolfgang Hänsch – Architekt der Dresdner Moderne (Berlin: form+zweck, 2009); Wolfgang Thoner and Peter Muller, Bauhaus Tradition und DDR Moderne: Der Architekt Richard Paulick (Munich: Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich, 2006); Rahel Lämmler and Michael Wagner, Ulrich Müther: Schalenbauten in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern (Salenstein: Niggli, 2008).

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dangers of measuring GDR Modernism in comparison to the standards of international Modernism, and suggested that instead it should be seen as one specific contribution to the movement’s broader developments.35 These revisionist works rarely address the political and aesthetic significance of art within the GDR built environment, just as public art tends to be overlooked in revisionist art histories. The Ostmoderne in architecture has better established its reputation than East German fine art (outside of the Leipzig school). More generally, audacious projects from Eastern Europe and the former USSR have spawned their own publishing genre of photographic archaeology; the deteriorating condition of buildings which once signified a socially reforming zeal and now laid bare to the logic of capitalism has contributed to general and heritage research interest.36 Public art has also benefited from this type of fascination with the material remnants of a lost culture: Martin Maleschka’s remarkable photographic research, undoubtedly the most expansive record of extant GDR public art, is now published as an architectural guidebook for the general public.37 However, an emphasis on validating the success of the Modernist over the socialist realist risks sanitizing East German art for Western tastes, ‘closing the chapter’ rather than leaving it open. For April Eisman, the ostensibly revisionist exhibitions Kunst in der DDR 38 and Abschied von Ikarus39 actually ushered in a ‘more insidious’ phase of the Bilderstreit by reframing East German art to satisfy Western expectations.40 In her study of Bernhard Heisig and his transformation of socialist realism, Eisman shows how Heisig’s rehabilitation post-Bilderstreit has posited him as ‘a great German artist in spite of the East German context’. Marlene Heidig develops a critical perspective focused on the art-historical rather than simply ‘documentary’ value of GDR painting, arguing that the storage of work in the Beeskow archive in Brandenburg effectively banishes it from collective cultural memory.

35

Ostmoderne, Butter and Hartung, 2004. Mark Escherich (ed.), Stadtentwicklung & Denkmalpflege 16: Denkmal Ost-Moderne (Berlin: Jovis, 2012); Roman Bezjak and Inka Schube, Socialist Modernism (Berlin: Hatje Cantz, 2011); Frédéric Chaubin, Cosmic Communist Constructions Photographed (Cologne, Taschen, 2011); Verschwundene Orte der DDR (Berlin: Bild und Heimat 2017). 37 Martin Maleschka, Baubezogene Kunst. DDR: Kunst im öffentlichen Raum 1950 bis 1990 (Berlin: DOM, 2018). 38 Kunst in der DDR Eine Retrospektive der Nationalgalerie National Gallery, Berlin, 25.07.2003 to 26.10.2003. 39 Abschied von Ikarus. Bildwelten in der DDR – neu gesehen, Museum Weimar, 19.10.2012 to 03.02.2013. 40 April Eisman, ‘Whose East German Art is This?’ Imaginations: Journal of Cross-Cultural Image Studies, Toronto, 21 May 2017. http://imaginations.glendon.yorku.ca/?p=9487. 36

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The interest in the Ostmoderne in architecture and emphasis on the emergence of Modernism in visual arts as evident in both scholarly and more general discourse coincides with the wider challenge to the hegemony of American and European Modernism. As historians seek to decolonize, gender and globalize Modernism,41 what defines the ‘socialist’ of socialist Modernism, or the ‘East’ of Eastern Modernism? Is it simply its geographical, temporal or ideologized situation? The politicized appropriation of a specific manifestation of cultural Modernism during the early Cold War, via the United States and within the Federal Republic of Germany,42 has not come under much scrutiny within the common narrative of East Germany ‘catching up’ with West Germany. The postwar crystallization of ‘the modern’ as a signifier of democracy and neutrality is eclipsed in favour of the assertion of a continuity with a pre-war ‘classical modern’, in particular the Bauhaus. The term ‘classical modern’ itself seems to homogenize the radical agendas and diversity of experiment which characterized the modern movement of the early twentieth century. At the same time, by relegating socialist realism as a doctrine which artists and architects had to overcome in order to re-enter the inviolable modern, the arbitration of historically valuable art is returned to the safe hands of artists and critics and away from the interests of working people. In other words, the narrative of ‘reclaiming’ Modernism in the Cold War context risks the diminution of a powerful movement of socialist art in twentieth century history.

Defining the socialist of socialist architecture and visual arts This question of how an artefact, a space or a culture might be defined as socialist drives much of the narrative of Picturing Socialism. The post-structuralist understanding, which disrupts the idea of inherent meanings, collides with the

41 See for example, Transcultural Modernisms, Model House Research Group, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna (Vienna, Sternberg Press, 2013); Alexandra Staub (ed.), The Routledge Companion to Modernity, Space and Gender (New York: Routledge, 2018); ‘Decolonizing Design’, special issue of Design and Culture – The Journal of the Design Studies Forum, Vol. 10, 2018 – Issue 1 (Abingdon: Taylor and Francis, 2018). 42 Frances Stoner Saunders, Who Paid the Piper? CIA and the Cultural Cold War (London: Granta Books, 1999); Joes Segal, ‘Artistic Style, Canonization, and Identity Politics in Cold War Germany, 1947–1960’, in Annette Vowinckel, Marcus M. Payk and Thomas Lindenberger (eds), Cold War Cultures, Perspectives on Eastern and Western European Societies (New York: Berghahn Books, 2012); Paul Betts, ‘Die Bauhaus-Legende: Ein Amerikanisch-Deutsches “Joint Venture” des Kalten Krieges’, in Alf Lüdtke, Inge Marssolek, and Adelheid von Saldern (eds), Amerikanisierung? Traum und Alptraum im Deutschland des. 20 Jahrhunderts (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 1996), 270–90; Greg Barnhisel, Cold War Modernists: Art, Literature, and American Cultural Diplomacy (New York: Columbia University Press, 2015). Barnhisel rejects Saunders’s characterization of the CIA or USA government as the singular driving force behind the developments.

Introduction

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very intention of socialist realist cultural production, which was to fix such meanings and which was underscored by a positivist understanding of a causal relationship between representation and received message. Studies in socialist material culture pioneered in the 2000s by culture and design historians such as Crowley, Reid, Betts and Pence43 revealed how real existing socialism in Soviet and Eastern European states gave rise to manifold cultural phenomena which, combined with official discourses on what was acceptable and appropriate, generated hybrid material and aesthetic cultures. ‘Official’ socialist culture, however, varied greatly between Eastern European states after 1954 when deStalinization began. The provocative American Industrial Exhibition in 1959 in Moscow put the realm of design at the centre of claims to East/West superiority, with technology and consumer culture witnessing the greatest aesthetic convergence and embrace of Modernist scientific-societal ideals.44 Clearly the West did not have a monopoly on Modernism as a social, intellectual and technological revolution. The Soviet Union in its early-twentieth-century trajectory favouring science, technology, newness, secularism, rationality, systems, progress, hygiene and culture over superstition, tradition and nature was uncompromisingly Modernist. Whilst reappropriating cultural Modernism as part of the Cold War competition on the design front, socialist states simultaneously drew on socialism’s own conceptual prospectus derived mainly from the Soviet aesthetic regimes of the avant-garde (1930–2) and socialist realism (1932–54). In Socialist Aesthetics,45 Köhring and Rüthers delineate some of these aesthetic concepts,46 for example the term ensemble, which was mainly used in architectural theory and important in the planning of public art. The ensemble was of course not unique to socialist society, but the public ownership of land and authoritarian means of planning facilitated the realization of the architectural and urban ensemble. In East Germany and other socialist states, the abolition of private land ownership enabled the realization of ideologically informed practices such as the scaling up and repetition of urban plans which abnegated privilege or individualism

43

David Crowley and Susan E. Reid, Style and Socialism: Modernity and Material Culture in Post-War Eastern Europe (New York: Berg, 2000); Socialist Spaces, Sites of Everyday Life in the Eastern Bloc (New York: Berg, 2002); Pleasures in Socialism: Leisure and Luxury in the Bloc (Illinois: Northwestern University Press: 2010); Paul Betts and Katherine Pence (eds), Socialist Modern: East German Everyday Culture and Politics (Michigan: University Press, 2007). 44 David Crowley and Jane Pavitt (eds), Cold War Modern: Design 1945–1970 (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2008). 45 Monica Rüthers and Alexandra Köhring (eds), Ästhetiken des Sozialismus/Socialist Aesthetics (Göttingen: Vanderhoeck Ruprecht, 2018). 46 These were reproduced in The Great Soviet Encyclopedia published by the Soviet Union from 1926 to 1990 as well as in East Germany in the Kulturpolitisches Wörtebuch (Cultural Political Dictionary).

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and created a spatial ‘equality’ of living. Did these generate a uniquely socialist culture, or socialist cities, space and artefacts? These possibilities as they were both imagined and realized in state socialism have been the focus of the research network Second World Urbanity.47 Kimberly Zarecor proposes a dual analytical framework to mark out the specificity of the socialist city: ‘infrastructural thinking’, ‘the decision making propelled by the requirements and scale of urban infrastructure’ and the ‘socialist scaffold [which] had an overarching ideological thrust that allowed a set of decisions to cohere into a recognizable strategy’. Here, socialist is not defined by form or aesthetics, but aesthetic and spatial qualities emerge as a consequence of the socialist planning. The ‘ensemble’ concept as well as a ‘socialist scaffold’ shaped the urban developments in the GDR. It was present in socialist realist showpiece ensembles of the early 1950s, in the remodelled city centres of the 1960s, and in the ‘living complexes’ from the 1950s and in de-centred developments such as Berlin Marzahn in the 1980s. These urban formations differed from Western urbanism and could be described as socialist. Torsten Lange reveals the socialist specificity of the concept of Complex Environmental Design, which emerged in East Germany in the 1960s and was developed in the 1970s. In rejecting the ‘representational’ function of architecture as Baukunst (architecture as an artistic practice) the concept of Umwelt (environment) proposed ‘a dialectical relationship between socialist society and its Umwelt, or (material) environment, which, on the one hand, was being shaped according to human needs, while, on the other hand, forming the basis for life in socialism’.48 Umwelt was defined in the broadest terms as ‘the total natural and artificial physical surroundings of the person with which he as a natural and societal life-being stands in interactive exchange’.49 This societal-environmental conception of architecture was also not unique to socialism but had a socialist-specific realization in the GDR. This included – importantly for the argument in this book – the significance of works of art within the designed environment. Katharina Pfützner’s Designing for Socialist Need also identifies the specificity of ideas and practices of industrial designers in the GDR, which again were concurrent with discourses not unique to the conditions of state socialism, in this case functionalism and anti-obsolescence in design. However, socialist design was not necessarily defined by the general principles of functionalist technical optimization. In his study of the Senezh studio of the Soviet Union (1964–91),

47

‘Second World Urbanity’ was founded by Daria Bocharnikova and Steven E. Harris in 2012. Torsten Lange, PhD Dissertation, ‘Komplexe Umweltgestaltung (Complex Environmental Design). Architectural theory and the production of the built environment in the German Democratic Republic (GDR), 1960–1990’ (London: University College London, 2016). 49 Bruno Flierl, Postdoctoral Dissertation, ‘Zur sozialistischen Architekturentwicklung in der DDR’, ISA, Bauakademie, Berlin 1979, 162. 48

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Tom Cubbin explores a more distinctly communism-orientated experimental practice which took inspiration from avant-garde productivism of the 1920s. This studio at the margins of sanctioned practice rejected official design or ‘technical aesthetics’50 which, they believed, ultimately led to the same consumerist mindset and worker alienation as in the West. Cubbin uses the term ‘communist surround’ to describe Senezh’s ‘construction of milieux that enable new forms of information exchange and assembly to liberate the individual from a mind-set that engenders a passive relationship to objects, environments and ideas’.11 Even if socialist content can be dematerialized through the concept of socialist culture, the temptation to associate aesthetic form with a given meaning seems irresistible. Boris Groys observes that ‘sots art’, Soviet postmodernism of the 1970s, whilst aesthetically similar to European and American art, ‘displays important distinctions dictated by the specific conditions in which it arose and developed . . . [and] arose in a situation in which the complete triumph of Modernism dispelled all illusions of purity and impeccability’.51 Groys’s wider argument also rests on the premise that aesthetic difference (between the Russian avant-garde and socialist realism) does not have to denote difference in political ambition; the fact that socialist realism was detailed for writing and then transferred to all art forms is testimony to its ‘anti-formalist spirit’, he argues.52 Whilst it undoubtedly the case that there is no stable relationship between a depiction or form and its meaning, it is also manifest that visual and aesthetic qualities, narrative and iconographies acquire semiotic value which will be readily decoded according to the context of cultural understanding. The myths in support of the socialist metanarrative53 which were disseminated in the cultural realm via all of the arts, but most pervasively in the visual arts, were powerful even as they became stale over time. The increasingly cultured citizen as propagated by the regime’s metanarrative was also discerning, a fact that contributed to the decline of effectiveness of the visual arts as a means of inculcating socialist values in the long term. However, public art too became more diverse, if not sophisticated. Figuration continued to dominate, but became more open-ended, less didactic. Art and design in public space dominated the visuality of the urban landscape – there was little to compete for space in the

50 Всероссийский научно-исследовательский институт технической эстетики) VNIITE: All Union Scientific Research Institute for Technical Aesthetics. 51 Groys, The Total Art of Stalinism, 11. 52 Ibid, 36. 53 This term is used to describe the method by which ideology was translated into politics and culture: ‘a body of discourse which presents a simplified form of the ideology and which is the vehicle of communication between the regime and those who live under it; it is the principal form of cultural mediation between regime and people’ in the Soviet Union. Graeme Gill, Symbols and Legitimacy in Soviet Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 3.

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imagination. Therefore, the ‘socialist content’ of the built environment persisted in material form. Picturing Socialism is attentive to both immaterial and material systems of socialist meaning in architectural art. Architectural art in its many manifestations was in itself a product of the ideological and cultural conditions which existed in East Germany; its prevalence and significance was a consequence of competing interpretations of how socialist ideology should be transposed into the urban cultural realm. The need to visibly ‘inscribe’ surfaces and spaces with socialist myths represents the understanding of culture as a means to reproduce and inculcate socialist ideology. These all prevailed in the GDR in the 1950s and 1960s and underwent transformation in the 1970s and 1980s. East German architectural art did not exist in the contrived opposition between realism and Modernism which was entrenched at the start of the Cold War. As both aesthetic and social transformations, socialist realist and Modernist architecture and art were discourses of modernity. The public art of East Germany adhered to tenets of socialist realism up to the end of the state in several ways. It was ‘of the people’. This is not a claim about the taste or response of the public, which is a further topic for research, but of the didactic, identity-forming functions of public art, whether functioning as ‘uplifting’ through realist narrative of ‘typical situations’ or as a colourful picture book invention or geometric pattern animating a concrete surface. Public art remained ‘partisan’ in its assumption to act on behalf of the state to educate and communicate to people in public space. The artists, also in using the realist method, borrowed from a variety of aesthetic vocabularies, material techniques and iconic traditions which they forged with the new, amongst them naturalistic and optimistic depictions, abstracting forms of early Modernism: expressionism, cubism, but also muralismo, concrete art, book illustration, medieval carving, renaissance and classical reliefs and sculpture. This is entirely in keeping with the principles of socialist realism which was an artistic method of reflection requiring a diversity of styles; it demanded the pursuit of syntheses between elements of tradition and of its own period. The artist’s task was to ‘draw the masses upwards towards self-understanding, through the power of the image to transmit sentiments’.54 The appropriation of different art forms reflected the artistic interests of practitioners, but it also remained in the spirit of realism, the aim of which was not to create a ‘genre’ or an ‘ism’, but a whole new approach to art. As a genre, the mural has a place both in Modernism and in historical tradition, in abstract and didactic art. The combination of ‘Modernist’ architecture and the inscription of socialist ideals, of the mechanically made concrete and glass 54

Catherine Cooke, ‘Socialist Realist Architecture: Theory and Practice’, in The Art of the Soviets: Painting, Sculpture and Architecture in a One-party State, 1917–1922 (New York: Manchester University Press, 1993), 86–103.

Introduction

21

surface with the organicity of mosaic, paint or tapestry, and of the propagandistic message with the vernacular of modern art all testify to the hybridity of this art form.

Public art in the 1970s and 1980s. Was this postmodern? What happened to architectural art in the late years of the GDR as faith in the promises of socialism and its material form was shaken? Public art benefited from Honecker’s promise of ‘breadth and variety’; younger artists began to experiment, and there was some revival of the graphic and multimedial forms of the 1910s–20s avant-garde. At the same time a form of neo-historicism was quietly ushered in as a means to revive the inner cities. Florian Urban’s interviewees in Neo-historical East Berlin55 flatly rejected the term ‘postmodern’ for this period, as did some of my own interviewees. But was this simply a semantic defence to insist on independence from trends in the West, where postmodernism does not have the same magnetism as Modernism? Urban claims that the turn to the historical image of the city in the late socialist period was an acknowledgement of the failed dream of Modernism, to which many architects in the GDR still aspired. This book identifies trends in the 1970s and 1980s which correlate with Western postmodernism in some ways but cannot be seen as an equivalent, as they remained rooted in a relationship to socialist ideology and the socialist organization of society and the economy.

Contexts of architectural art Art and design education Art schools reopened soon after the end of the Second World War, and after some reorganization following the founding of the GDR in 1949, there were four academies of art or art and design in Berlin, Halle, Leipzig and Dresden. Classes for architectural art existed within the fine arts, architecture and design, but commissions for public space were open to graduates of any discipline. For example, from 1950 to 1958 the Institut für künstlerische Werkgestaltung (Institute for Artistic Craft) in Burg Giebichenstein in Halle held classes in mural painting and later built up a reputation for tapestry design.56 The Dresden

55 Florian Urban, Neo-historical East Berlin; Architecture and Urban Design in the German Democratic Republic 1970–1990 (Farnham: Ashgate, 2009), 236. 56 The school was called ‘Institut für künstlerische Werkgestaltung Burg Giebichenstein’ from 1951 and ‘Hochschule für Industrielle Formgestaltung’ from 1958.

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Hochschule für Bildende Künste (Academy of Arts) and the Berlin Weissensee Kunsthochschule Berlin (Art School Berlin)57 offered classes in mural painting. In Berlin, Max Lingner had the post of Malerei für Zeitgeschehens (Painting for contemporary events) from 1948. His students made huge murals for state celebrations, such as 1 May and the III Weltfestspiele (World Festival Games) in 1953. From 1973 to 1992 mural painting at Dresden was led by Gerhard Bondzin. These classes and departments did not cross over into other departments. However, teachers from all disciplines got involved in important commissions.58 In Berlin, the most prominent practitioner of architectural art was Walter Womacka, rector of the school of art from 1966 to 1988. Womacka developed the Institut für Baugebundene Kunst (Institute for Building-Related Art) in Berlin in Monbijoupark around 1967 for research, experimentation and the realization of commissions. He was perhaps the most active in promoting student involvement in public art projects – for example, in the late 1960s for the redeveloped Alexanderplatz in Berlin. Graduates of the three-year courses at Fachschulen (polytechnics) for Applied Arts in Heiligendamm, Erfurt, Leipzig, Magdeburg, Potsdam and Sonnenberg were also in demand for works of architectural art. Before entering art school (for five to seven years) or going on to further professional training, artists, craftspeople and designers in the GDR routinely undertook two to four years’ training (Lehre) in technical and craft skills.59 Some examples of such apprenticeships preceding an art school education are stonemason, blacksmith, carpenter, woodcarver, metalworker, ceramic modeller, decorative painter, technical draughtsperson, stained glass designer, lithographer, photographer, letter former, poster painter, weaver, textile designer, colour and surface designer. Entrance to an art school education was highly competitive, but graduates, excepting those with problematic political records, could apply for membership of the Verband Bildender Künstler or VBKD/VBK-DDR – a process that took three years and an entrance exam. Membership gave the right to work as a freelance artist, to benefit from artists’ tax rates, and access to commissions, exhibitions, travel and conferences, studio space and materials.60 In the absence of a private art market, public art commissions were an important source of income for artists and craftspeople.

57 Kunstschule des Nordens 1946–7; Hochschule für angewandte Kunst 1947–50; Hochschule für bildende und angewandte Kunst 1953–69; Kunsthochschule Berlin 1969–90. 58 Guth, Wände der Verheissung, 1995, 57. 59 For a bibliography and overview of arts education see Daniel Hechler and Peer Pasternack, Künstlerische Hochschulen in der DDR (Leipzig, Akademische Verlagsanstalt, 2015). 60 The Artists Association of Germany (Verband Bildender Künstler Deutschlands or VBKD) merged all of the existing associations such as der ruf, das Ufer in to a single union in 1950. After June 1952 there were regional sections for each of the fifteen ‘Bezirke’ of the DDR. The Artists Association was separated into different specialist groups and was responsible for handling commissions. Akademie der Künste archive information on the Verband. https://archiv.adk.de/bigobjekt/37005.

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Commissioning The process of commissioning and selection of thematic content for works in the new build areas was formalized by 1968 through the establishment of local Büros for Architekturbezogene Kunst (offices for architectural art). The term ‘contract giver’ is used in this book rather than patron, as the public or societal contract giver was a name that implied the ‘democratic’ relationship between art and people – that is, the societal contract giver acted on behalf of the people, not as an elite or a philanthropist. The offices for architectural art worked together with the VBKD. All of these organizations were closely allied to the city and district offices of the ruling SED. Such administrative structures aimed to improve cooperation and planning between architects and artists, as well as to maintain a political ideological oversight.61 Declining budgets for architectural art caused by wider economic decline may have exacerbated perpetually strained relations between artists and architects, but these tensions often stood as a proxy for frustration with government ministries.

Gender This book is written with a gender awareness but does not focus on individual biographies either male or female, or on how gender is depicted, which I have discussed in relation to public sculptures elsewhere.62 Almost all of my interviewees were male, partly because I found that no prestige projects of monumental art went to female artists, although many belonged to collectives responsible for realization.63 In fact, after the completion of the government building, the Palast der Republik (Palace of the Republic) in 1974, few prestige commissions were awarded at all. Women were slightly better represented as professional female artists and architects in the GDR than in the Federal Republic of Germany, but still underrepresented given the political claim to male and female equality.64 One of the contributing factors to the low visibility of women is

61 There were other bodies which could award commissions: people’s own companies (VEBs), societal organizations such as trade unions, the democratic women’s organization (DFD), the church, political parties and private persons (Guth, Wände der Verheissung, 29–34). 62 J. R. Jenkins, ‘Tractor drivers, mothers and nudes: Decoding the feminine in East German public sculptures’, in Ted Hyunhak Yoon and Bernke Klein Zandvoort (eds), Decoding (Dictatorial) Statues (Eindhoven: Onomatopee, 2018), 170–92. 63 The handful of prominent female artists in the mainstream such as Leah Grundig and Susanna Kandt Horn were not known for works of architectural art. 64 By the end of the 1980s, women comprised more than 25 per cent of the artists exhibited at the Dresden German Art Exhibition. They also made up 33 per cent of the Artists’ Union and over 40 per cent of the students in the four main art academies. In the West women in the documenta exhibitions ranged from just 4 per cent in the 1950s to 13 per cent in the 1980s (Eisman, 2014, 176).

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also due to the fact that aside from the prominent artists and architects who continue to have a public profile today (even though this is often negative), many artists and architects did not receive public recognition even where they held positions of high responsibility due to the emphasis on collective working.65

Budgets for architectural art The principle of the allocation of a percentage of a building’s budget for art was inherited from the pre-GDR period. The sum varied between 1 and 3 per cent but was reduced to 0.5 per cent in the 1970s housing programme. Works may also have been financed from other budgets, for example party, union and church funds. By 1982 the budget for art in housing developments was reduced to a relatively low sum of 45 East marks per living unit.66

Exhibitions and publications Besides the ten national exhibitions in Dresden from 1946 to 1988 in which architectural art took an increasingly important place, there were numerous regional and local art exhibitions. Special dates such as the twentieth and thirtieth anniversaries of the GDR were celebrated with art exhibitions, organized according to genre, locality or artist. Increasingly, historical artists rejected in the period of dogmatic socialist realism were rehabilitated.67 The VBK-DDR and BdA published ten editions of a richly illustrated catalogue, Bildende Kunst + Architektur, of architectural art from 1969 to 1984.

Sources and methodology Picturing Socialism uses an approach pioneered in design and material culture histories. It sees objects and actors at all levels as having agency within the given systems of meaning (here, political-ideological), inverting determinist models which position objects as the manifestation of edicts. Working from a very close examination of debates and cross-referencing these as they appeared in professional publications and with the recollections of those interviewed, I aligned

65 Tanja Scheffler, ‘Die großen Unbekannten: Architektinnen der DDR’, Bauwelt online edition, 02.11.2017. (Berlin: Bauwelt.de) https://www.bauwelt.de/themen/betrifft/Die-grossen-UnbekanntenArchitektinnen-der-DDR-3045387.html 66 Claudia Büttner, Geschichte der Kunst am Bau in Deutschland (Berlin: Bundesministerium für Verkehr, Bau und Stadtentwicklung, 2011), 23. 67 For an overview of GDR art exhibitions, see Stanford University’s Dokumentationsbibliothek DDR Kunst: https://web.stanford.edu/~nauerbac/ddr%20kunst_exhibit_sept10/ddrkunst/exhibitions.html

Introduction

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the results of this primary research with a number of discourses, primarily the rhetorical Cold War opposition of Modernism and socialist realism and the reception and communication of the heritage of East German culture post-1990. The scope of this work encompassing developments in urbanism, architecture, art and design has of necessity meant that many important works, artists, ideas and visual analyses had to be left out of this book. I was absorbed in the culture and environment of post-reunification East Germany for many years, which gave me a strong sense of attitudes and the process of historicization. The cultural historian Catriona Kelly makes an important point when she observes that studies of fine arts and architecture under Stalin often ignore the human drama involved in creating works of art which have sometimes been seen as floating signifiers.68 I was interested in how the history discussed here evolved through the actors who were instrumental in creating it – through their disputes, ambitions and allegiances. An obvious omission from this study is an investigation of the reception of public art. Whilst I did conduct some interviews with residents, this did not feel sufficient to draw generalized conclusions. Some documentary journalism uncovered mixed responses to works in Halle-Neustadt at the time, but again this seems too anecdotal to make any important contribution to this particular piece of research. However, my absorption in German culture from 1991 onwards was instructive for understanding processes of history and heritage making.

Interviews Interviews with architects, critics, artists and designers deepened my knowledge of the way in which processes of change occurred, how the tasks were described and understood, the relationship to power and censure, the sense of influence or dissonance, and how conflicts and alliances built up. In each case I spent at least half a day with the interviewee in their home or studio and in many cases much more than this, with discussions still continuing for months and years after the original interview. Interviewees were incredibly generous, opening up chapters from the past made all the more complex by the conditions in the present, and sharing material from their personal archives. Undoubtedly the handling of the legacy of GDR culture post-reunification coloured the reflections made by interviewees on the achievements and failures of the socialist state. I have not regarded this as ‘tainting’ the past, but as situating it in the present, in the same way that this history is situated in its historical moment.

68 Catriona Kelly, ‘Windows on the Soviet Union: The Visual Arts in the Stalin Era’, Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 14, no. 4 (2013): 837–52. DOI:10.1353/kri.2013.0052.

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Texts An important primary source was the transcripts of debates which took place within the professional circles of the national and local organizations of the artists’ and architects’ associations and their respective journals, Bildende Kunst and Deutsche Architektur/Architektur der DDR . These texts framed reflections and new ideas in a critical mode: good examples could be lauded, but art and architecture were in a perpetual process towards full socialism. As a result, all kinds of deficits could always be understood as part of that process, rather than as being of any administrative-systemic nature. A close reading of a number of articles reveals the creative ways in which official expectations for socialist realism and the ‘synthesis’ of art and architecture were expanded. For the period after 1968, the most useful archival sources were the transcripts of discussions of the ZAG (Central Working Group of Art and Architecture), a joint forum of the artists’ and architects’ associations and its small circulation publications.69 After consulting many such protocols and published articles, it became easier to read the intentions of the speakers, whether wholly conformist or subtly critical. Form und Zweck (after 1965/2 form+zweck) was an important journal for craft and design and later of interest to architects and planners. It was less closely observed by the authorities than Deutsche Architektur and became a vehicle for ‘reform discourse’ and one in which new ideas for environmental design were discussed. Farbe und Raum (colour and space), a magazine for painters and colourists (not artists), provided many examples of how variety and colour was achieved. Under the editorship of Wolfgang Kil in the 1980s, it too became a vehicle for critical discourse. Publications for the general public, such as Für Dich, Neue Berliner Illustrierte, Neues Deutschland and other local and national papers, presented achievements in a more popular and upbeat way than the professional publications. Local SED archives including planning and correspondence provided useful insights into relationships between some artists, artists groups and political leaders, and of the relaying of decisions regarding censure. However, in general, the Party archives consulted did not include detailed reasoning or discussion.

Works of art and design – an archaeological search This history is particularly concerned with the actual visuality and physicality of objects. An essential method was visual analysis, an approach drawn from broad design and visual studies of how form (colour, composition, scale, gesture,

69 Edited transcripts of some of the ZAG seminars were produced under the title Architektur und bildende Kunst, published either by the BdA-DDR or the VBK-DDR. Eleven issues, 1977–89.

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material) and content (iconography, narrative, reference) together act as signifiers. This research took me to many towns and residential estates in the former East Germany where I could directly observe spatial relations (often altered) and many works still in place. It was always a delight to discover something unexpected. This was a kind of archaeological research which brought alive everything I uncovered in archives and interviews.

Structure and chapters Part One: Reconstruction, art and ornament (1945 to 1963) Chapter 1 asks what kind of artistic responses were made in response to the horror of the Second World War, the Nazi period and the holocaust. It looks at the competing artistic agendas during the four-power occupation of Germany (1945–50) during which a politically motivated opposition between Modernism and abstract art and socialist realism became entrenched. A consequence was that socialist artists had difficulty to establish muralism as an art form for the new era because it became a proxy for the Cold War ideologization of art. Chapter 2 shows how whilst muralism was rejected as an autonomous genre, there was an important place for art integrated within architecture. This dovetailed with the ideals of the synthesis of the arts which had a lineage within socialist realism as well as briefly within the Soviet avant-garde and post-war Modernism. Examples of architectural art practice from the first socialist realist grand axis ensembles, from the steel town of Stalinstadt (renamed Eisenhüttenstadt after 1953), the universities and the artistic collective neue form in the brown coal town Hoyerswerda, illustrate the ways in which artists negotiated socialist realism using traditional methods, narrative and iconography whilst at the same time introducing Modernist-influenced abstracting visual forms.

Part Two: Developing a realist Modernism (1959 to 1973) Chapter 3 turns to theoretical developments which were to reconcile the shift to industrialized building with the ideological requirement for socialist realist art and architecture. Vehemently contested positions for the function of architecture between reformers led by the Swiss émigré architect, Hans Schmidt and conservatives found a way forward through the sustained importance of art as an ideological inscriptor within the built environment. At the same time, the practice of design emerged as an artistic and socially organizing practice which could help

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realize a socialist architecture. Chapter 4, with a focus on the largest new urban project of Halle-Neustadt, explains the impact of the shift in theory towards a socially oriented conception of the built environment on architectural art. The Modernist urban plan underpinned by socialist realist thinking created distinct patterns for the art and design of urban spaces as well as developments in iconography which became commonplace throughout the republic. I describe the hybrid approach which emerged from the competing interests as ‘realist Modernism.’ Chapter 5 examines four examples of the creative proposals of architects and artists which represented personal artistic innovations whilst being embedded in the differing demands and restrictions on public art of the time.

Part Three: From the monumental to the unreal (1973 to 1990) The final chapters look at the transition to new forms of public art in the 1970s and 1980s in the Honecker era. Chapter 6 considers the impact on understandings of public space and the visual arts of the X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) which took place in Berlin in 1973, and the influence of the artistic-design realization of this event on subsequent conceptions for architectural art. Chapter 7 turns attention to the north coastal town of Rostock. The progression away from the orthodoxy of socialist realism over the decades reached its furthest limits as the ideals of a kind of authentic joy in socialism gave way to a general search for localized pleasures through building designs and humorous, decorative works. The authorities feared losing control as artists, designers and critics gained in confidence to promote new approaches for a more social urbanism, but at the same time, this opening up of discussion, for example at the ZAG working group of artists and architects, ultimately exposed a loss of common purpose.

PART ONE

Reconstruction, Art and Ornament (1945 to 1963)

29

30

Chapter 1 Modernism, Realism and Muralism – the Struggle for Art in Post-fascist Germany

What had once been Dresden was destroyed. Like a dog stuck in a house with a dead person, one could have stood and howled for hours, a bitter grief.1 These words, written in a letter to a friend by the artist Jeanne Mammen, express a grief, anger and helplessness which must have been widespread in 1945 but which seemed to evade public life. Much later, the writer W. G. Sebald provoked anger by claiming that Germans coped with the horrors unleashed by Nazism by means of collective amnesia. In particular he took writers to task: ‘the sense of unparalleled national humiliation felt by millions [of Germans] in the last years of the war had never really found verbal expression.’2 If this was true of writers, the same may be said of artists, who found no clear way to articulate what had happened, veering in to aestheticization, avoidance and absolution of responsibility. But how much space was there for German artists to articulate responses, caught between making good the lost years under the Nazis, appealing to a stubbornly conservative public, and satisfying the programmes of re-education imposed by the occupying powers? In spite of bitter conditions, the aftermath of the war was filled with liberated voices facilitated by the occupying powers in line with their own foreign policy interests. In 1944, Britain and USA had toyed with the idea of transforming Germany into a country ‘primarily agricultural and pastoral in character’.3 But the country was to serve a much more useful geopolitical role, in which culture was to play a central part through a polarization of aesthetic regimes.

1 Letter from Jeanne Mammen to Hans Gaffron, 29.12.1946, Biographie, Versuch einer Bioschaffrie (Berlin: Förderverein der Jeanne Mammen Stiftung, 2018). 2 W. G. Sebald, On the Natural History of Destruction (London: Random House, 2003). 3 The 1944 Morgenthau Plan titled ‘Suggested Post-Surrender Program for Germany’.

31

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Axes of modernity in the pre-war period This polarization of aesthetic regimes – ‘Modernism versus realism’ – became so ingrained over the course of the Cold War that it is worth considering how ideological systems had sustained both aesthetic approaches in the preceding decades. Variants of realism were imposed in the Third Reich and in the USSR in the 1930s as the subjectivism of Modernist experiment was rejected in favour of more orthodox, historically rooted aesthetics. The radical ideas and elemental formal language of Constructivism and Productivism of the 1910s and 1920s were brought to an end in the early 1930s under Stalin in favour of more distinctly readable art forms. The term ‘realism’ is difficult to pin down – avant-garde movements could also be thought of as realist because they spoke to real events in a direct and raw language and rejected ‘art’ as a bourgeois endeavour, even though avant-garde works rarely employed any kind of verisimilitude. However, Stalin favoured socialist realism, claimed to be more fitting for working people. Named Zhdanovist after its instigator, Andrei Zhdanov (1896–1948), it was to use traditional media, be affirmative, close to everyday life, historically rooted and ideologically connected to the Communist Party. When Zhdanov set out the tasks for writers at the 1934 Soviet Writers Congress, to ‘remould the mentality of readers and thereby become engineers of human souls’,4 the largest foreign delegation was the German contingent, who were effectively training for a communist post-war Germany; many were artists and KPD members in exile from the Third Reich, including the writer and communist Johannes Becher, who was to head the Kulturbund in 1945.5 One of those German KPD members who saw the future Germany following the Soviet model was Alfred Kurella, who rejected the Modernist tendencies in the name of ‘humanism’.6 Kurella had been himself an avant-garde artist and founder of the avant-garde group Oktjabr; in the GDR he was to play a pivotal role in martialling art within the orthodoxy of socialist realism and was behind the programme of the Bitterfelder Weg.7 But realism did not have to be a revolutionary art form. It also flourished in the United States in the 1930s, supported by the introduction of federal support for

4

Andrei Zdhanov, ‘Soviet Literature. The Richest in Ideas, the Most Advanced Literature’, Speech delivered at Soviet Writers Congress, August 1934. www.marxists.org/subject/art/lit_crit/ sovietwritercongress/zdhanov.htm. Transcribed by Jose Braz for the Marxists Internet Archive [accessed 27 May 2020]. 5 Goeschen, Vom Sozialistischen Realismus, 2001, 13. 6 Ibid 20–2. 7 See Glossary.

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artists aimed at mitigating the impact of the Great Depression.8 The emphasis of the ‘American Scenes’ movements was to identify and reflect on American culture; in the Midwest this manifested as a conservative ruralism that shunned modern life. This contrasted with the muralism that grew from New York where politically committed artists, unpersuaded by Soviet socialist realism, looked in the early 1930s to the Mexicans Diego Rivera, David Alfaro Siqueiros and José Clemente Orozco for an art close to the people, politically in the right place but modern in its visual language.9 Some of these socialist muralist artists in New York, such as Jackson Pollock, became the protagonists of abstract expressionism which took its place, vigorously promoted by institutions such as the MoMa, New York collectors and individuals, in particular the art critics Clement Greenberg and Harold Rosenberg, who set their sights on shifting the centre of Modernism from France and Germany to New York – and succeeded. This process was expedited by the diaspora of Modernist artists, architects and intellectuals who fled Europe for America in the 1930s and 1940s. This brief survey indicates the difficulty of attaching any of the histories which fall under Modernism or realism to a political direction. Rather than Modernism and realism, perhaps two axes of modernity can be identified: one axis can be characterized as claiming local and national tradition, favouring mimetic depiction, readability and proximity to the people; and the other as avant-gardist, emphasizing newness, progress, secularism, a preoccupation with formal means, and the dissolution of class and regional signifiers such as ornament. But there are many points of imbrication and variation. Nazi aesthetics accommodated Modernism alongside Volkishness,10 and Modernists included borrowings from the ‘primitive’ in their pursuit of universality. The Mexican muralists generated admiration for the sheer originality and visual power of their work, but no doubt also because they succeeded in uniting formally innovative means with socially radical ideas. Much of the public art of the GDR borrowed from the Modernist idiom but insisted on ideological connectedness and the persuasive power of art. The partisan potential of the mural as a medium came to a head in the 1930s and was manifest in both ‘progressive’ and ‘populist’ forms. Romy Golan argues that the mural was understood as a means to address the modern condition – ‘home versus homelessness, the erosion of aura, monumentality versus nomadism’.11 It had the potential to cross both axes and offer an organic

8

There were a number of programmes, notably the Works Progress Administration’s Federal Art Project (WPAIFAP; 1935–43) and the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP; 1933–4). 9 Jody Patterson, PhD Dissertation: ‘Modernism for the Masses: Painters, Politics, and Public Murals in New Deal New York’ (London: University College London, 2009). 10 Paul Betts, The Authority of Everyday Objects: A Cultural History of West German Industrial Design (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004). 11 Romy Golan, ‘From Monument to Muralnomad’, 2002.

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counterpoint to the stark surface of Modernist architecture. This contrast was played out at the V. Milan Triennale and the 1937 World Expo in Paris, best known for the towering confrontation of the Soviet and German pavilions, both of which follow the monumental-traditional-national axis. The Spanish pavilion (Josep Lluís Sert, Luis Lacasa) itself demonstrated the way in these languages were understood: a consciously Modernist architectural design was intended to warm the Western powers to the Republican cause – and whilst Picasso’s Guernica was its best-known legacy, the pavilion was replete with agit-prop communist photomontages by Josep Renau. In spite of the obvious potential of the monumental mural to fulfil socialist ideals such as collective working, direct mass communication, popularization of art, it found no immediate place in the re-education and de-Nazification in occupied Germany. It was tainted from its service to fascist Italy (Mario Sirona) and to an extent by Nazi Germany;12 American and Mexican muralism were too parochial to serve the search for a renewed Modernism in Germany. Where the mural did have a place within socialist realism as well as a continuity with the Weimar Republic was as work of art in synthesis with architecture.13 This would be a realism, in Catherine Cook’s words, ‘to transmit messages and myths to audiences who were themselves always “moving forward” as their political consciousness and aesthetic sensibilities developed’.14 In 1945 it was still too early for that.

Cultural initiatives in the Soviet zone of occupation 1945–7 Immediately after the unconditional capitulation of the German forces on 8 May 1945, the Soviet Military Administration (SMAD) began building a cultural infrastructure in line with plans made by German KPD exiles in Moscow during the war years.15 But other communist sympathizers who identified with cultural political concepts of Weimar who returned from exile in the West or had remained in Germany were not particularly accounted for in these plans, and often had difficulties to integrate with the Party line.16 (The Communist Party or KPD was merged with the Social Democratic Party, becoming the Socialist Unity Party or SED on 21 April 1946.)

12 Although the national socialists apportioned a percentage of building budgets for art, in Hitler’s Germany the number of flags and hand-crafted eagle-swastika emblems required for buildings exhausted most of the budget. Büttner, Geschichte der Kunst am Bau in Deutschland, 12. 13 Friederike Schuler, Im Dienste der Gemeinschaft: Figurative Wandmalerei in der Weimarer Republik (Marburg: Tectum, 2017) 14 Catherine Cooke, ‘Beauty as a Route to “the Radiant Future”: Responses of Soviet Architecture’, Journal of Design History, Vol. 10, No. 2 (1997), 137–60, 143. 15 Goeschen, Vom Sozialistischen Realismus, 13–26. 16 Ibid, 25–6.

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The Kulturkammer (Chamber of Creative Artists) created on 6 June 1945 set about rehabilitating defamed artists and organizing exhibitions as well as using archival records to identify which artists had cooperated with the Nazis. At this time, the SMAD did not push for a socialist art but was careful to demonstrate its democratic credentials through support of a plurality of artistic forms in accordance with the Potsdam Conference (17 July–7 August 1945) which agreed on a programme of de-Nazification, demilitarization and democratization. Immediately following the conference, the Soviet administration established the Kulturbund zur demokratischen Erneuerung Deutschlands (Cultural Association for Democratic Renewal in Germany), which organized events, concerts, performances, lectures and a monthly paper. It was headed by Johannes Becher, one of several groups of German exiles flown in from Moscow who as early as 1944 had proposed that freedom would be achieved through ‘democratisation and politicisation’ – in other words, a socialist ideological education in which the term democracy stood for the interests of the working-class majority. This direction of travel was also clear in a statement made at the first cultural conference of the KPD in February 1946 by the head of the Dresden section of the Moscow group, Anton Ackermann. Ackermann introduced the maxim that was to be implemented in 1950: that art would be ‘socialist in content and realist in form’. Realism here importantly referred to the adoption of national traditions. This would take time to develop, however. In the meantime, freedom of art was a necessity.17 The Western powers were uneasy about the rapidly developing Soviet influence in the four sectors. The Kulturkammer was closed in 1946, and the Kulturbund was banned in the Western zones from February 1947. In the Western zones the French took the lead in the arts, promoting their Modernist heritage, the British responding with Henry Moore.18 This was a period of historicization rather than renewal or moving forward. The actual realization of fascism taken to its logical conclusion made an anachronism the anxieties of modern art: what place could there be for the celebration of technology, for the absurdities of Dadaism, the pathos of Expressionism, the surrealist landscape or the biting satire of Otto Dix, George Grosz or John Heartfield? Whilst the need to rehabilitate defamed artists was a priority, there was no way to simply ‘reconnect’ with the classical modern as if the intervening years could be assigned to

17

Anton Ackermann, first cultural conference of the KPD in February 1946, ‘Unsere kulturpolitische Sendung. Um die Erneuerung der Deutschen Kultur’, 3–5 February 1946 (Berlin: Neuer Weg, 1946), 52. 18 John-Paul Stonard, Fault Lines: Art in Germany, 1945–1955 (Ridinghouse: London, 2007), 121–6. The British were slow off the mark. The French were the most active with Modern French Painting (Berlin, 1946), Abstract French Painting (Düsseldorf 1947/8), Liberated Art (Celle, 1946) and Modern German Art since 1933 (Düsseldorf, 1947).

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historical footnote. Thus, for those favouring a reprisal of 1920s Modernism, this was also a period of reorientation. For the American operation the situation vis-à-vis modern art was rendered more complex by a powerful lobby in the USA which viewed modern art as communist and unpatriotic. Following a debacle where the touring exhibit ‘Advancing American Art’ was prematurely terminated by Republicans, the US Congress voted in 1947 against the use of tax monies for international promotion of modern art, and so frustrating the ambitions of the New York art elite keen to compete on the international scene. Support for modern and abstract art came improbably from the CIA. Formed in 1947, the intelligence agency recognized the value of liberal culture to convince a sceptical European and specifically German intelligentsia of America’s cultural credentials, but more importantly to capitalize on the disillusionment of leftist intellectuals with Soviet communism.19 The anti-Communist magazine Der Monat was launched in Germany in October 1948, offering a blend of articles by intellectuals such as Jean-Paul Sartre and Bertrand Russell, art critic Clement Greenberg, and reports on life in the Soviet gulag and advertisements for Coca Cola and automobiles.20 The increasingly apparent anti-Modernism stance in the Soviet zone aided the Americans’ cause. Nonetheless American Modernism had to wait until the late 1950s to make its mark in Europe, when the MoMA organized tours of new American painting in Europe in 1958 and at the 1959 West German documenta II . Not everything was determined by the interests of the occupying powers. Private galleries opened and new artists groupings were formed in a wave of optimism and confidence. As early as 1945, former ASSO member Fritz Duda sought out artists in Berlin including Horst Strempel to form a new group in continuity with the 1928 communist ASSO, the ‘Association of Revolutionary Visual Artists’, which had had around 800 members before it was banned by the Nazis in 1933.21 The new Arbeitsgemeinschaft sozialistische Künstler (Working Collective of Socialist Artists) worked in support of the KPD/SED and against the ‘dictatorship’ of ‘established artists’.22 Das Ufer, a socialist collective, was formed in Dresden 1947 to actively support the ‘construction of socialist life’ and Die Fähre in Halle and Künstleraktiv 48 in Leipzig were in the same spirit. These

19

Stoner Saunders, Who Paid the Piper? 30. Der Monat, archived at Central and Eastern European Online Library. https://www.ceeol.com/ search/journal-detail?id=391 21 Members well known in the West include John Heartfield, Käthe Kollwitz, George Grosz, Otto Dix and László Moholy-Nagy. Many of its artists suffered terrible fates for their activities with the communist resistance, such as Eva Schulz-Knabe, sentenced to life in a Labour camp (freed in 1945); her husband Fritz Schulz was executed. 22 Gerd Dietrich, Politik und Kultur in der SBZ 1945–1949 (Bern: Lang, 1993), 270, 335. 20

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artists also sought continuity of tradition, in this case with revolutionary ideals of proletarian culture – the kind of agitational art which had already been rejected in the Soviet Union in favour of academic realism. Der ruf, in contrast, founded by Edmund Kesting in 1945, was oriented to Modernist and abstract art; the constructivist Hermann Glöckner was a member.23 There were less overtly political groupings too. On Berlin’s Kurfürstendamm, the Galerie Gerd Rosen sought a reprisal of the classical modern and became a social and intellectual gathering point for a Berlin avant-garde, amongst them Willi Baumeister, Hannah Höch, Wolfgang Frankenstein, Ernst Wilhelm Nay and Jeanne Mammsen. In an exhibition of December 1946, Fotomontage von Dada bis Heute, Höch advanced the Dadaist montage as appropriate for the new era – although none of the new works shown offered the kind of biting critique of their pre-war manifestations.24

The first national Dresden exhibition in 1946 The pivotal event of these years was the first all-German art exhibition in Dresden with the title Künstler Schaffen für den Frieden (Artists Create for Peace). This event became established as the reference for development in the arts in the GDR right up to 1988 and was countered in the West with the Kassel dokumenta starting in 1955, which asserted the primacy of abstract art. The mixed artistic interests of the jury members in Dresden, all victims of Hitler’s art policies, were reflected in the selection of works. Importantly, this exhibition was a survey and an atonement of what had been lost, a kind of catharsis. Most commentaries on this event focus on the tactical range of artistic directions, from late impressionism to Die Brücke, as signifying the SMAD’s calculations with regard to a united Germany. But we can also read the curators’ and artists’ mood through the depictions of femaleness. Women were represented in roles typical of bourgeois art – as nudes, with moments of female intimacy, of self-reflection, or mourning. A few titles of works executed in various Modernist idioms make the point: Stehende Frau im Langen Kleid (Standing Woman in a Long Dress), Frau mit Spiegel (Woman with Mirror), Frau vorm Spiegel (Woman in Front of a Mirror), Akt (Nude), Damenporträt (Portrait of a Lady). The female mother figure was also used as the embodiment of pain or poverty projected through the suffering and grieving mother by Käthe Kollwitz and Magdalene Kreßner with Trauende (Grieving Woman). But this had already

23 Petra Jacoby, Kollektivierung der Phantasie? Künstlergruppen in der DDR zwischen Vereinnahmung und Erfindungsgabe (Bielefeld: transcript, 2015), 114. 24 Stonard, Fault Lines, 36–42.

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been seen before the war. The female figure here stood in a different way to the bourgeois images but still acted as a kind of repository for a masculinist world view. There was no apparent shift in terms of the socialist programme, something which was markedly present after the establishment of the GDR. In general, the works represented a kind of palatable Modernism, not formally innovative and almost all figurative.25 The moderate nature of the exhibition did nothing to reassure the visiting public hostile to ‘unrealistic’ art; negative feedback from visitor surveys was then used to justify a shift towards socialist realism in the Eastern sector. The antipathy to modern art may have had roots that stretched deeper than the influence of Goebbels’s campaigns, but some comments made clear a preference for the art of the Nazi regime, sometimes euphemistically referred to as ‘Munich art’ – a reference to the ‘Great German Art’ exhibitions from 1937 to 1944 in Munich.26 The success of Hans Sedlmayr’s bestselling tirade against Modernism, Verlust der Mitte (Loss of the Centre), also cast doubt on the successes of ‘re-education’ with respect to culture. However, the responses of East and West indicated the respective agendas: for the Western allies, the acceptance of modern art by lay people was regarded as a test of tolerance and democratization. Conversely, for the KPD/SED Party cadre and socialist artists, public opinion as recorded justified further insistence that artists must move to a closer connection between art and the people. The role of the artist in society and their connection to working people was integral to the understanding of realism. Nowhere could the dynamics between politics, art and the public be better observed than in the early years of the art journal, bildende kunst, which was launched in April 1947 under its two founders Oskar Nerlinger and Karl Hofer. Whilst claiming to be non-partisan, the journal initially leaned towards an embrace of the innovations of the modern in service of an art which connected with ordinary people. Modernist typography was used, and the journal title was set in lower case (and changed to upper case after relaunch in 1953). These are significant details which point to a wished-for connection with the achievements of German 1920s Modernism. The journal had a pedagogical tone; the studied patience of a veteran teacher countered diatribes against Modernism in readers’ letters. The articles were at pains to explain to the generation conditioned by ‘deep weeds which grow on the most sterile land . . . We want to show the ways in which awareness has been achieved that art is not

25

Catalogue, Allgemeine Dresdener Kunstausstellung 1946, Stadthalle Nordplatz, August–October 1946. (Dresden, 1946). 26 Stonard, Fault Lines, 96–101; Bernd Lindner, ‘Kunstrezeption in der DDR’, in Günter Feist, Eckhardt Gillen and Beatrice Vierneisel (eds), Kunstdokumentation 1945–1990 SBZ/DDR. Aufsätze. Berichte. Materialien (Cologne: DuMont, 1996), 62–93.

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a copy of nature.’27 Nerlinger, whose share in the journal was underwritten by the SED, underlined the importance of artists reconnecting with the people.28 Reflecting on the Dresden exhibition, the art critic Carl Linfert explained that ‘the medium itself is a form of communication, not just the depicted’.29 Architect Hermann Henselmann berated the generation of thirty- to forty-year-old artists for what he saw as their lack of courage and pathos. ‘We used to dream of cathedrals of socialism but today we talk about the mud huts of refugees.’ In editorial, the difference between Picasso and a child’s drawing was explained.30 Showcasing both historical and contemporary work, mostly figurative – a range which included Paula Modersohn Becker, Jeanne Mammen, Holbein, Paul Nash, Bruegel, Chagall, Matisse, Gerd Caden, Willi Baumeister, Mexican social graphics, as well as Bauhaus design, reviews of Soviet art and introductions to modern architecture – the journal reflected interests in developing artistic discourse but also in an art which was socially and historically conscious, for example drawing attention to female artists.31 The emphasis through the articles was on creating something new, but without ever being able to develop this, hence an ongoing reliance on pre-war Modernism. In the first issue, a letter from a reader, ‘Franz B. from Steglitz’, is reproduced. Franz B. sets out at length his credentials as a knowledgeable amateur art lover who, whilst admittedly keeping his head down in the Nazi years, had rejected Hitler’s art, but having seen a recent exhibition he felt compelled to write. Franz B. asks, given the total spiritual destruction of the Germans, what place can there be for art? Sirs, we have tortured and killed I don’t know how many Jews, decimated the Russian people, innocent old men, women, children, systematically plundered and laid waste to the continent – do these facts not disturb you? . . . And on the other problem of what to do next: we want to make amends, to rebuild . . . a people heavy with guilt, outcast, outdated, we get blindly behind such great demands as socialism, anti-militarism, humanism, about which we understand nothing. And create still lives, seascapes, nudes or play with abstract flourishes, marks, bright colours.32

27

Karl Hofer, ‘Zum Geleit’, bk 1/1947. Oskar Nerlinger, ‘Was will die “Bildende Kunst”’, bk 1/1947, 10. 29 Carl Linfert, ‘Erinerungen an die Dresdener Ausstellung’, bk 1/1947, 12–13. 30 Hermann Henselmann, ‘Generation ohne Nachfolger’, bk 1/1947, 14–15. 31 Herman Müller, ‘Die Frau in der Bildende Kunst’, bk May 1947, 15–22. The piece highlighted the work of Jeanne Mammen, Alice Lex, Renee Sintenis and others and asked if it was possible to identify something feminine in the work of female artists. 32 Franz B., ‘Brief eines ehemaligen Kunstinteressenten’, bk May 1947, 26–7. 28

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In reply, Carl Ernst Matthias, listed in this issue as one of the two editors, explains to Franz B. that as a privileged and cultivated person it is only now can that he has a taste of the deprivations always known to the working class. Whilst it is not yet known what shape it will take, a timely art will unfold when it connects organically with the people – abstract art and the like are just preliminary studies for what is to follow.33 This reply took a harder line than most of the content and directly pointed to the reorientation of art towards unity with working-class people in the future. Matthias’s class-conscious reply was important because he was also responsible for reporting in this first issue on the 1946 Dresden art congress at which the principles of Zhdanovist socialist realism were publicly introduced for the first time.34 In spite of Matthias’s interventions, the journal was hardly a mouthpiece for Soviet socialist realism in its first year; its reasoned responses to readers’ concerns about Modernist art may well have been composed with the Soviet/ SED authorities in mind. However, a debate about the function of art was forced into the open in 1949 when Hofer openly criticized the use of art to serve political purposes, after which Ackermann proposed that any pieces in favour of abstract and modern art could be published, but always with a counter-argument.35 By this time it was clear that the route was taken towards Soviet-style realism. This event took place after the Cold War and consequent division of Germany had effectively been set in motion by the unilateral currency reform in the Western zones on 20 June 1948. The introduction of the Deutschmark by the Western allies left a surplus of Reichmarks which immediately threatened economic collapse in the East (although the reform was not initially introduced in Berlin), forcing the Eastern zone to create their own new currency, the Ostmark. East Berlin responded to the division with the blockade of West Berlin. These events made way for the entrenchment of strategic opposition, causing a deep and lasting cultural schism in which both superpowers adopted a set of platitudes to characterize the other. Each side then defined itself as the opposite of the other, and the rhetoric became more extreme and clumsy. At this time socialist artists began to organize mural commissions as a socialist art form, which would also secure artists some income. Up until this point there had been some mural commissions which exposed the difficulty of the mural as a form of affirmative art during a transitional political period. Those murals which depicted the trauma of war tended to the decorative or expressionist. Two

33 Carl Ernst Matthias, reply to ‘Brief eines ehemaligen Kunstinteressenten’, bk May 1947, 26–7. The other editor is listed as Ernst Wüssten. After July 1948 Gerd Pommeranz Liedtke became editor. 34 Carl Ernst Matthias, ‘Kunstlerkongress in Dresden’, bk May 1947, 11. 35 Meeting led by Anton Ackermann in the culture department of the central office of the SED, 12 March 1948 on the future of the journal. Reproduced in Goeschen, Vom Sozialistischen Realismus, 269–71.

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examples: Bert Heller’s Umseidler, Heimkehrer (Resettlers, Homecomers) on three walls of the town hall of his hometown of Wernigsrode (Heller was later to become rector of the Berlin art school and receive prestigious commissions such as for Café Moskau in Berlin). The groups of figures in a rhythmic, subtly coloured painting in biblical-style procession has pathos but with a restraint which risks aestheticizing the conditions. In complete contrast, Willy Lahn’s 1948 Kriegsbrandstifter sind Verbrecher! (Arsonists of War are Criminals) at the fire station on the Nordplatz in Dresden is an expressionist work depicting a Christlike dying figure who lies over an air raid shelter crammed with people whilst others flee into the inferno. Notwithstanding the increasingly public antipathy of the former Moscow exiles led by Ackermann towards expressionism, these works illustrate the dilemma of figurative murals immediately after the war. Either they made reality palatable or they risked rejection for being too harsh which could undermine the dominant affirmative narrative of re-education and renewal. Nonetheless, the Berlin ‘Working Collective of Socialist Artists’ was keen to work with the mural as a revolutionary form and so initiated an agreement with the direction of the national railways (Reichsbahn) to create murals for the railway stations which were the subject of investment in the 1949/50 two-year plan. The first and only contract to be fulfilled in October 1948 was Horst Strempel’s Trümmer Weg, Baut Auf! (Clear the Rubble, Rebuild!) in the ticket hall of Friedrichstrasse station. The uncertainty of the artist in the new conditions is evident in this work, if we compare it with his popular and visually coherent Nacht über Deutschland (Night over Germany). Trümmer Weg, Baut Auf! uses a Christian triptych format and is a hybrid of expressionist pathos, cubist gestures, socialist realism in the contemporary muscular forms and emphasis on industry, and hints of Ancient Egyptian iconography. Strempel’s mural was attacked immediately in the press by Soviet culture officer Alexander Dymschitz, but equally in the Western press. Criticisms of artists were published in the general press, giving the appearance of enlisting popular opinion against the ‘disconnected’ artist. Opinions on Strempel’s mural were solicited from passersby and were reported to be mixed: nonetheless the mural was officially rejected36 and hung for just two years before it was removed.37 The enthusiasm for the mural form amongst socialist artists was given ample coverage in bildende kunst in 1949, with articles in favour of the genre by the

36 Alexander Dymschitz, SMAD culture officer, ‘On the Formalist Direction in Soviet Painting’, ‘Uber die formalistische Richtung in der deutschen Malerei’, Tägliche Rundschau, 19 November 1948, and a further anonymous attack in January 1951: N. Orlow, ‘Wege und Irrwege der modernen Kunst’, Tägliche Rundschau 21 and 23 January, 1951. N. Orlow is a pseudonym and there have been different suggestions as to who this represented. Sigel suggests Vladimir Semjonovich Semjonov (Sigel, 2012, 249). Eisman suggests Kurt Magritz (Eisman, 2018, 26). Plausibly the pseudonym was for more than one writer to represent the Soviet cultural line on realism. 37 Alice Lex-Nerlinger, ‘Das Wandbild als Forderung unsere Zeit’, bk 3/1949, 92–3.

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writer Anna Seghers who had known Rivera in Mexico, and Alice Lex-Nerlinger, who reclaimed the authority of the mural form by setting out its tradition as a people’s art form. Seghers had seen Strempel’s work in Friedrichstrasse station and made a cautious case for muralism in the Mexican model.38 The idea of promoting the mural at the next General Art Exhibition in Dresden in 1949 was taken up by artist and Party loyalist Gert Caden, who had also been impressed by the painting syndicates of the Mexican muralists Rivera, Siqueiros and Orozco.39 Over thirty artists, many of them members of the socialist associations of Berlin and Dresden, as well as Meissen and Chemnitz, worked mainly in collectives on twelve portable murals for the Dresden exhibition, almost all of which had the industrial workers in Saxony factories as their subjects.40 The works reveal the potential of a diversity of realisms which was to carry through into public art in the GDR. The possibility of a simplified and stylized narrative is most explicit in works less often mentioned in accounts of this event, such as Siegfried Donndorf’s Grosskraftwerk Hirschenfeld and Max Erich Nicola’s Feinmechanik Zeiss-Ikon. Donndorf’s is explicitly stylized, with an emphasis on linear contours and which use flatness to an advantage (Figure 1.1). Nicola’s, too, avoids naturalism, dividing the picture space into upper and lower planes rather than creating the illusion of depth, and inserting a ‘window’ in the left area where children are at supervised play as a counterpoint to work (Figure 1.2). These mural techniques, which also allow for symbolic differences of scale and unnatural sectioning of the composition reminiscent of Christian religious or primitive painting, were pioneered for their revolutionary potential by Diego Rivera. Nicola’s Feinmechanik Zeiss-Ikon – though less monumental – demonstrates a direct compositional relationship with Ralph Stackpole’s Riverainfluenced Industries of California at Coit Tower, San Francisco (which was part of the federally sponsored mural programme in the USA fourteen years earlier),41 and in turn Rivera’s 1933 Detroit Industry murals. We can see in these works the way in which a hybrid muralist visual language was developing. In the same way as American muralism, it could be both affirmative and socialist.

38

Anna Seghers, ‘Diego Rivera’, bk 3/1949, 90–1. Caden, 1949, in Martin Schönfeld, ‘Das “Dilemma der festen Wandmalerei”: Die Folgen der Formalismus-Debatte für die Wandbildbewegung in der SBZ/DDR 1945–1955’, in Feist et al., Kunstdokumentation, 1996, 291. 40 All the works were later destroyed; only Karl-Erich Schaefer, Paul Sinkwitz, Willy Wolff: Reichbahnsverbesserungswerk and Erich Gerlach, Kurt Schütze: Berufsschulung were purchased. Most of the works can be seen through deutschefotothek.de. 41 Public Works of Art Project at Coit Tower. Twenty-six artists painted murals depicting contemporary San Francisco life. Most of the muralists were disciples of famous Mexican artist Diego Rivera and painted in his social realist style; four of them, like Rivera, had clear leftist political agendas. Masha Zakheim, Coit Tower San Francisco: Its History and Art (San Francisco: Volcano, 2009). 39

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Figure 1.1 ‘Großkraftwerk Hirschfelde’, (Hirschfelde Power Plant) Collective Siegfried Donndorf, Willy Illmer, Fritz Tröger, Dresden 1949. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / LBS.

Figure 1.2 ‘Feinmechanik Zeiss-Ikon’ (Fine Mechanics Zeiss-Ikon), Collective Max Erich Nicola and Jürgen Seidel, Dresden, 1949. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / LBS.

In spite of their depictions of factory life, the murals were all rejected in the press, and all but two destroyed soon after. In his detailed analysis of the episode, Martin Schonfeld brings the rejection of the murals in connection with the joyless conditions at the various factories, suggesting that the proletkult art was not wished for, given that ‘the working class was not actually so

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revolutionary’.42 It seems likely that the rejection of the murals was a consequence of the broader hard-line political manoeuvring at this time. The murals and most works at the exhibition can be viewed on the Deutsche Fotothek, which reveals also an interesting series of staged photographs showing cleaning workers reacting to the works, seemingly alienated by abstraction.43 Some of the murals were closer to the desired realism than agitprop of the 1920s, but it was a feature of the outbreaks of attacks on ‘formalism’ that there was no clarity on what was specifically unacceptable or acceptable. The mural was extremely politically sensitive as a genre due to its specific function as public art and its critical role in connecting with people. Other murals executed in this period were also removed, for example, Hermann Bachmann, Fritz Rübbert and Willi Sitte’s mural for the state administration school in Ballenstedt 1949, later whitewashed,44 and Hermann Kirchberger’s 1948 formally expressionist mural for the National Theatre in Weimar, removed in 1949.

The onset of the cultural Cold War

Figure 1.3 First Cultural Conference of the SED, 1948. Photograph Berlin © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Abraham Pisarek.45

42

Martin Schönfeld, ‘Das “Dilemma der festen Wandmalerei” ’, 300. http://www.deutschefotothek.de/documents/obj/70600930, image 5. 44 Guth, Wände der Verheissung, 1995, 82. 45 Gerd Dietrich, ‘Zwischen Klassikmythos und Proletkult: Zur Kulturpolitik der KPD 1945/46’, Utopie kreativ, Issue 64, February, Berlin 1996, 75. 43

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The formalism ‘debate’ which sacrificed the Dresden murals put an end to any kind of development for a socialist art other than the Soviet model of realism. The diaspora of influences brought back to Germany from the war years was not able to form any kind of coherent response to the competing interests of a renewal of pre-Nazi movements and the ready-formed Soviet socialist realism. Whilst socialist realism rejected many forms of art, it was defined primarily not in aesthetic terms but in the function of art and the role of the artist in society. Thus, the apparent antipathy of lay people as judged by responses to exhibitions and letters to the papers became a force for repressing anything other than the Soviet model, even though this meant alienating and denigrating many committed socialist artists. In the Western zones too, there was limited artistic development. The necessary atonement of the injustices of the Nazi era trawled through every variety of Modernist art, from surrealism to the Bauhaus, but did little in fact to inspire intellectual renewal and left an open question as to how to progress – one which was gradually answered with abstract art. The German people did not embrace Modernist art, but this posed less of a problem in the West, where art could remain as a discourse for the initiated. There had been little time for a German post-war art to develop before the realism/abstraction division was aligned to the ideological programmes of the superpowers. This is not to say that artists were without agency, as has been suggested in the case of artists in the East.46 Many artists and intellectuals left the Eastern sector when it became clear that there would be a hard-line arts policy. But many stayed, and some crossed from West to East. Some were committed communists since the 1920s. For others, deciding for socialism was the only plausible response to Hitler fascism. The war and fascism left deep scars for many artists and remained not just a recurrent theme but also a deeply felt reason for committing to socialism in the GDR. Recent scholarship has been at pains to complexify the picture of an American imposition of modern art (in particular abstract expressionism) as a weapon of the Cold War,47 rejecting earlier theses which propose a deliberate and coordinated strategy organized by the government and the CIA intelligence agency.48 It is the case that abstract art developed in Western Germany in the 1950s before the arrival of abstract expressionism from the United States. But even if the USA was not ready to propagate its own modern art until the late 1950s, it showed no such reticence in the fields of architecture, urban planning

46 David Pike, The Politics of Culture in Soviet-occupied Germany, 1945–1949 (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 1992), 486. 47 Greg Barnhisel, Cold War Modernists: Art, Literature, and American Cultural Diplomacy (New York: Columbia University Press), 2015. 48 For example, Who Paid the Piper, Stoner Saunders.

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and design. Bauhaus founder, Walter Gropius, who had taken exile in the USA, was enlisted as a consultant to General Lucius Clay to promote Modernist urbanism in Germany as early as 1947, and a number of exhibitions of a comfortable American modern architecture and lifestyle were promoted before the separation of Germany.49 There were obvious dividends for allied Western countries in finding a common direction that could be characterized as the opposite of communism. The United States’ interest in being understood as a serious international player in the world of elite art dovetailed with West Germany’s need to demonstrate its post-fascist, liberal democratic credentials. Nonetheless, not everyone shared this apparently liberal ambition for the arts, as became evident in the West German debates over renewing a programme of funding for art in new buildings in 1950. Here the conservative tendency against art that was ‘incomprehensible’ was invoked once more.50 Neither socialist realism nor abstract art were movements which dealt with the legacy of Nazism, but they were ways to re-envisage the new reality. The convenient division served the ideological interests of the superpowers and concealed a more complex reality, particularly as socialist realism was being reimagined in the East and Modernism was losing ground in the West by the 1960s. Nonetheless, this opposition was etched into the Cold War mindset where the opportunities for first-hand experience of the other side diminished. The caricature of East German art as not ‘free’ (and not art) was quickly revived in its post-1990 reception.51 In 1949 Germany was formally divided in to two states: the Federal Republic of Germany in the West and the German Democratic Republic in the East. Those hoping for any kind of revival of the avant-garde in art or architecture were to be disappointed. As Walter Ulbricht became the first leader of the new German socialist state, the primacy of architecture as art, appropriating national tradition, was established.

49 ‘Built in the US, 1932–1944’, published in Germany in January 1948, and the 1949 exhibition ‘How America Lives’. The catalogue for the exhibition ‘Architektur der USA seit 1947’ presented examples of the newest architectural trends and provided models for many German architects. Werner Durth, ‘Architecture as Political Medium’, in Detlef Junker (ed.), The United States and Germany in the Era of the Cold War, 1945–1990: Volume 1, 1945–1968 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 480–7. 50 Büttner, Geschichte der Kunst am Bau, 47. 51 This easy division into free and unfree was immediately mobilized after the fall of the Wall in media discourse and public history, for example the exhibition 60 Jahre – 60 Werke Kunst aus der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (1 April–2 June 2009, Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin) which was opened by Chancellor Merkel. No works of East German artists were included on the basis that they were not ‘free’.

Chapter 2 The Synthesis of Art and Architecture During the Transition to Industrialized Building With the founding of the GDR in October 1949, the implementation of Soviet socialist realism was definitive. The idea of murals that had been nurtured by socialist collectives was subsumed by the primacy of an architecture that appropriated national tradition, in which art nonetheless had an important place. Art as an element within architecture had been maintained during both the Weimar Republic and the Third Reich in Germany as a civic and political principle; in continuity with the principle of Kunst am Bau (art within buildings), regulations for culture in March 1950 accorded 1 to 2 per cent of building funds, including repairing old buildings, for ‘realistic art, close to the people’.1 The contours of socialist realism were quickly established through regulatory frameworks, a study trip for leading architects to the Soviet Union in April/May 1950 and an unforgiving rhetoric.2 Attempts from 1945 to 1950 to reappropriate 1920s Bauhaus and Modernist ideas were cut short.3 Concepts for a new, open and horizontal urbanism envisaged by Hans Scharoun (Neues Bauen), Hermann Henselmann and others, or modular architecture such as Ludmilla Herzenstein’s 1949 loggia housing in Berlin-Friedrichshain was condemned by Walter Ulbricht in 1950 as ‘cosmopolitan fantasy’.4 But having been carefully nurtured and

1

The law was revised in 1952 and stipulated that art should be for the development of a progressive German culture. Büttner, Nachkriegsmoderne, 20. 2 The 1950 ‘Reconstruction Law’ launched the high-tempo national construction programme to which the population was mobilized to support through donations and voluntary help. 3 Hubert Hoffmann in Dessau, Hermann Henselmann in Weimar, Mart Stam in Dresden and BerlinWeissensee, Walter Funkat at Burg Giebichenstein, Alfred Wegehaupt in Greifswald. Hubert Hoffmann made multiple attempts to reinstate the Bauhaus at its Dessau site, making connections with the Soviet avant-garde design school. Following a meeting with Alexander Abusch and Johannes R. Becher (Kulturbund) and Gerhard Strauß, Hoffmann writes to Walter Gropius: ‘We have just about given up on Dessau.’ Andreas Butter, Neues Leben, Neues Bauen: Die Moderne in der Architektur der SBZ/DDR 1945–1951 Chronologie (Berlin: Schiler Hans Verlag, 2006) 54. 4 Walter Ulbricht at the third party conference of the SED, 20–24 July 1950 (Berlin: Neues Leben, 1950), 165.

47

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brought to fruition, the period of national tradition as a key ideological signifier turned out to be short-lived. Stalin’s death in 1953 saw his successor Nikita Khrushchev define his own aesthetic programme in a joint enterprise with Modernist designers who wished to assert their knowledge and expertise, sweeping away what they saw as the lowbrow kitsch of Stalinist design.5 Ornament, with its promise of grandeur for the working classes, was to be dispensed with in favour of economy. In the GDR there was not an immediate embrace of this apparent lurch to Modernism; nonetheless, the departure from Stalinist socialist realism saw developments in architectural art shaped by a new generation of artists tasked with alleviating the monotony of a standardized built environment. Contrary to most accounts, this was not a break into Modernism in the GDR, but, I contest, a modernization of realism. Rather than socialist Modernism, Ostmoderne or East Modernism, I suggest the departure from national tradition which retains the central principles of realism as an approach would be better described as ‘realist Modernism’. The term realist more precisely encapsulates the tenets of realism as a specific artistic method, rather than ‘socialist’, which refers more generally to a political system.

Critical assimilation of architectural traditions in alignment with socialist values In the Soviet Union, the principle of ‘critical assimilation’ of regional architectural and folk heritage had been successfully applied in the republics such as Georgia, Armenia and Ukraine.6 With the establishment of the Eastern bloc after 1948/9, architects were tasked with the same process of appropriation of national and regional traditions in the newly socialist states. This is consistent with the axis of modernity set out in Chapter 1 which looks to historicity, local rootedness and tradition in opposition to pre-war socialist and socially reformist ideals manifested in Russian constructivism, Frankfurt Neues Bauen7 and the Bauhaus. Modernist architecture labelled as ‘formalist’ and ‘cosmopolitan’ was rejected because it was viewed as lacking this rootedness in place and history. Equally important were socialist realist concepts for urban planning which were set out in the ‘Sixteen Principles of Urbanism’ in July 1950.8 These preserved an organic relationship to the historical structure of the city, its landscape and rivers in a rejection of the CIAM ideal of the open, low-density city which was considered

5 Susan E. Reid ‘Destalinization and Taste, 1953–1963’, Journal of Design History, Vol. 10, No. 2 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), 177–201. 6 Cooke, ‘Beauty as a Route to “the Radiant Future” ’, 49; Art of the Soviets, 100. 7 See Glossary. 8 These were agreed upon in Moscow in 1948.

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too anonymous.9 The Sixteen Principles combined societal aims with functional operations. Aesthetics, spatial arrangements and historical rootedness were a means to implement both the central political core and the social patterns of ‘basic rights to employment, housing, culture and recreation’. Thus, the city centre comprised high-density monumental buildings and an appropriately urban silhouette to communicate the necessary political hierarchy.10 But equally, the residential areas were not to be isolated entities but should contain all necessary cultural and social infrastructure. These principles were only partially implemented in the GDR. A 1950 urban plan for the centre of Berlin was to ‘give expression to the strength and power of the will to reconstruction and the great future of Germany through monumental buildings’.11 But the planned trinity of a central building, faced by a central square, in which a monument of Karl Marx was to sit, reached by a central axis was continually stalled and eventually abandoned.12 The importance of monumental buildings and heroic sculptures as representative of an authentic socialist city – principles which had been established in 1918 in the Soviet Union through Lenin’s Plan for Monumental Propaganda13 and through the Moscow urban and architectural competitions in the 1930s – were in a continual tension with the (latently Modernist) economically and technologically efficient open urban-architectural plans which took precedence in the GDR in the 1960s. The political significance of these differences, which accompanied debates throughout the 1950s and 1960s in the GDR, dated back to the early Soviet Union and represented in simple terms a tension between intellectual/cosmopolitan/machine-oriented and ‘popular’/localized/folkish/craft approaches.14

9

CIAM, Congrès internationaux d’architecture moderne. The fourth CIAM conference on the Functional City, initially to be held in Moscow in 1932 and ultimately held on the cruise ship sailing from Marseille to Athens in 1933, proved to be the turning point away from attempts to ally the Modernist project with socialist ideals. Eric Mumford, ‘CIAM and the Communist Bloc, 1928–59’, Journal of Architecture, 14(2): 237 (2009), 237–54. 10 Architecture was to ‘give expression to the strength and power of the will to reconstruction and the great future of Germany through monumental buildings’. Walter Ulbricht, ‘Die Grossbauten um Fünfjahrplan: Rede auf dem III Parteitag der SED’, in Neues Deutschland, 23.07.1950. 11 Ibid. 12 Bruno Flierl, ‘Der Zentrale Ort in Berlin – Zur räumlichen Inszenierung sozialistischer Zentralität’, in Feist et al., Kunstdokumentation, 1996, 128–39. 13 A. Lunacharski, ‘Lenin o monumentalnoi profaned’, Literaturnaya gazette, 29.01.1933, 4–5. The earliest date Lunacharski gives for the plan is the winter of 1917. Christina Lodder, ‘Lenin’s Plan for Monumental Propaganda’, in Matthew Cullerne Brown and Brandon Taylor (eds), The Art of the Soviets: Painting, Sculpture and Architecture in a One-party State, 1917–1922 (New York: Manchester University Press, 1993), 16–32. 14 See Catherine Cooke on the defeat of constructivist architectural groups such Moisei Ginzburg’s OSA and AsNovA by the regional more proletarian group VOPrA with the support of Lunacharski under Lenin in 1929. ‘Socialist Realist Architecture’, 91–3.

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The critical appropriation of national or regional traditions was put into practice immediately in 1950. The most well-known and prestigious was Stalinallee, the central axis in Berlin, but the principles were also realized in a rapid tempo in the Ringbebauung in Leipzig, the Altmarkt and Grunauer Strasse in Dresden, Lange Strasse in Rostock, Breiter Weg in Magdeburg, as well as ensembles in smaller towns. Individual projects of restrained grandeur, such as culture houses, were built as part of this programme in the first five-year plan of the GDR state.15 The enormity of the construction tasks did not sacrifice an extraordinary attention to architectural detailing and the integration of ornament and art. People deserved grandeur and, it was assumed, were appreciative of ornament. East German architects educated in the period of 1920s Modernism did not necessarily appreciate these things, however. The planning and building of Stalinstadt16 as the ‘first socialist city’, to serve the new steel industry of the Eisenhüttenkombinat was beset with difficulties faced in implementing the Sixteen Principles of Urbanism.17 Plans proposed by former Bauhaus student Frank Ehrlich and then Otto Geiler that cut across the existing landscape were rejected in favour of another by Kurt Leucht that made a dominant feature of the steelworks, which were joined to a public square by a central avenue. In 1952 and 1953 Walter Ulbricht, who took an active interest in architecture, intervened personally to demand more decorative detailing in the architecture, invoking the ‘taste and dignity’ of the working people who allegedly had protested at the sparsity of the initial designs, and did not expect to live in ‘egg boxes’.18 This absence of recognition of the necessary departure from ‘formalism’ by some architects was accompanied by a spate of articles in the national paper, Neues Deutschland. Writing in February 1951, Kurt Liebknecht acknowledged some success of modern architects ‘Behrens and Pölzig and the younger architects Corbusier, Oud and Gropius’ who had succeeded in foregrounding function, but it was at the expense of ‘art’, leaving only a ‘beautiful technical product’. The UN building in New York was a contemporaneous example of how Modernism had been appropriated in the United States to serve its ‘idea of world domination’.19 The Soviet realist concept, Liebknecht insisted, ‘takes account of the people’s sense of beauty and (has turned) the architecture back into art’. A 15 Simone Hain, Stephan Stroux and Michael Schroedter, Die Salons der Sozialisten: Kulturhäuser in der DDR (Berlin: Ch. Links, 1996). 16 ‘Furstenburg, first socialist city’ from 1950, ‘Stalinstadt’, 1953–61, ‘Eisenhüttenstadt’ from 1961. The city was given the name Stalinstadt a few days following Stalin’s death in March 1953. 17 Werner Durth, Jörn Düwel and Niels Gutschow, Architektur und Städtebau der DDR, Vol. 1, Ostkreuz: Personen, Pläne, Perspektiven (Frankfurt: Campus, 1999), 356–414. 18 These criticisms were voiced within Neues Deutschland and within the factory newspaper in 1951, which put forward the viewpoint of the worker who did not expect to live in ‘egg boxes’. Ostkreuz, Vol. 1, 372. 19 Kurt Liebknecht, ‘Im Kampf um eine neue deutsche Architektur’, Neues Deutschland, February 13, 1951.

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key feature of the Soviet practice was the integration of works of ‘the sister arts, sculpture and painting into the buildings to reinforce the architectural expression’.20 The idea of the ‘sister arts’ (which delivered ideological content) is critical, because if we look at some of the Soviet socialist texts made prior to the more well-known definition of realism made by Zhdanov at the 1934 writers’ congress, we can see that the idea of a ‘synthesis’, an integration of arts, is present both as a constructivist ideal and in its transformation into what was to become the doctrine of socialist realism between 1929 and 1932. Catherine Cooke demonstrates the central role played in this transition by Lenin’s ‘People’s Commissar of Enlightenment in the Soviet Union’, Anatoly Lunacharski, who was responsible for the implementation of Lenin’s Monumental Propaganda in 1918 and for the eventual dispensing with the international Modernist tendencies in 1929 in favour of architecture ‘closer to the people’.21 Addressing the Communist International in 1921, Lunacharski made explicit the role of ornamentation of architecture: ‘The natural form of their [the proletariat] art will be the traditional and classical one . . . resting . . . on healthy convincing realism and on eloquent, transparent symbolism in decorative and monumental forms.’ In elucidating the brief for the Moscow Palace of the Soviets, Lunacharski, ‘consciously or not using constructivist shorthand’,22 explained: The functional method of the design must be supplemented by a corrective: an artistic treatment of the form. All the spatial arts must be employed: architecture, which gives proportionality of the parts; painting, which uses colour; sculpture, for the richness of light and dark, in combination with lighting technology and the art of the producer.23 The reference to both art and design functions bear a striking similarity to the ideals of Complex Environmental Design which emerged later in the GDR. We can see in these texts the way in which the idea of popular taste embedded the importance of the integration of works of art into the architectural environment, but which also accommodated elements of Modernist design. In the Soviet socialist realist architecture of the 1930s and 1940s, art was an essential component, as evidenced by the fact that the Academy of Architecture in Moscow had its own dedicated studio for monumental painting from 1935 to 1948, which worked on around fifty projects integrating monumental painting within architecture.24 20

Ibid, 4. Christine Lodder, Lenin’s Plan for Monumental Propaganda, 21–5; Catherine Cooke, ‘Socialist Realist Architecture’, 88–95. 22 Cooke, ‘Socialist Realist Architecture’, 94. 23 Ibid. 24 Cooke, ‘Beauty as a Route to “the Radiant Future” ’, 145. 21

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Semantic exchange: the response of artists and applied artists to critical assimilation The difficulties experienced by socialist artists who tried to promote muralism in the years preceding the founding of the GDR appear to have been a result of the polarization of the early Cold War, which demanded a very strict adherence to Socialist soviet realism of that era. Murals and the use of art as propaganda in public space was rooted in both Leninist and Stalinist traditions, but they had to be integral to the architectural ensemble. In the 1950s, the possibilities of architectural art proved to be an area of experiment allowing for individual artistic styles. Many artists were decorative artists skilled in traditional techniques and able to quickly adapt iconography and decorative elements to the principle ‘national in form, socialist in content’. On the facades of the neoclassical Stalinallee in Berlin, decorative stone, porcelain and terracotta art and ornament formed a composite of representations of the new social order – in Soviet socialist realist terms, obrazy (‘images’). Obrazy was the term used in the Soviet Union for forms which resonated in the population’s consciousness and were deemed progressive, making a bridge between cultural heritage and the socialist future.25 Traditional decorative elements such as intertwining plants and flowers, animals, birds, fish and bees existed alongside etched lettering with declarations or quotations set within the buildings, for example, the honouring of the achievement of the National Reconstruction. Elongated starbursts and wheatsheaves followed traditions of Soviet ornament (Figures 2.1 and 2.2). In most of the figuration of the architecture of national tradition, allegory was replaced by ordinary people engaged in their roles for the literal and metaphorical reconstruction. For example, a set of figures set on the top of a connecting arcade building on Stalinallee portrayed a scientist, a mother with child, a teacher and a young female pig farmer. The most commonly depicted working figures were the manual worker and the farmer, which could be male or female, and usually both in a symmetrical pairing (Figure 2.3). On Leipzig’s Roßplatz, full sculptural figures set between columns included a high proportion of children, clothed according to the period, but occupied in activities such as playing the harmonica, recorder or lute as a reference to secular or folk music. In others, boys are seen to play at their own city-building with bricks. A remarkable example of semantic exchange can be found in Leipzig where a socialist realist reconstruction was adjoined to the former Grassi Museum (1895, Hugo Licht). The socialist realist building consciously appropriates the classical idiom of Licht’s anthropology and applied arts museum. Set in the niches beneath the columns of the Grassi are ‘exotic’ figures representing the different continents (all recently restored), exemplary of the 19th century colonial mindset: in the early 1950s socialist realist adjunct, the figures in the corresponding recesses are simply attired working people (Figure 2.4). 25

Ibid, 148.

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Figure 2.1 Decorative ceramics, Stalinallee (artist not identified), Section C, Architect Richard Paulick, 1952. Photograph © J.R. Jenkins 2019.

Figure 2.2 Ornamental painting, Stalinallee (artist not identified), Section C, Architect Richard Paulick, 1952. Photograph © J.R. Jenkins 2019.

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Figure 2.3 Figures on Stalinallee, (artist not identified), Section C, Architect Richard Paulick, 1952. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019.

Figure 2.4 Left: figure inset within niche beneath column on former Grassi Museum (now Leipzig city library). Architectural artists: Adolf Lehnert, Carl Seffner and Jacob Ungerer. Right: corresponding figure on the east side adjoining socialist realist building. Artist and architect not identified. Photographs © J. R. Jenkins 2013.

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The sculptures and reliefs of the architecture of national tradition presented a mainly progressive discourse: the new anti-bourgeois role of women, learning, trades and agricultural collectivization were emphasized. The female figure was occasionally put in a leading position, as with one of Alfred and Gisela Thiele’s terracotta reliefs on the Ringbebauung in Leipzig, where the female is leading an explanation to the male labourer (Figure 2.5). These works of stonemasons, decorative artists and sculptors set between columns, below balconies, on lintels and supraportes are modest – not triumphant, but ordinary. In line with realism, they referred to everyday situations (typichnost or typicalness), but unlike the 1930s realism in the Soviet Union, such as the opulent Moscow metro, there was no sense of a ‘radiant future’26 or ‘gleam’.27 Socialist allegories were present in, for example, the child experimenting with flight, a woman carrying harvest bounty, or the mother figure representing the symbolic category of motherhood.28 Some motifs, such as the family unit, politically organized youth and the centrality of work, offered continuity with central motifs of National Socialist propaganda. The architectural art undoubtedly met the conventions of realism, but there was no bombast or utopian promise. Undoubtedly there was little appetite amongst German artists and architects for any such affectation.

Figure 2.5 Alfred Thiele and Gisela Richter-Thiele, Leipzig, 1955. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 26

Cooke, ‘Beauty as a Route to “the Radiant Future” ’, 147. Tijana Vujosevic, ‘Soviet Modernity and the Aesthetics of Gleam: The Moscow Metro in Collective Histories of Construction’, Journal of Design History, 26 (2013), 270–84. 28 Hans Rudolf, The Reaper, Sgraffito, Berliner Strasse 115a and 125b, Schwedt/Oder, 1954. 27

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Reorientation in Moscow Whilst many of these projects were underway, the appropriation of national tradition was thrown into doubt by the abrupt change of course towards industrialized building methods announced in Moscow in December 1954. Soviet architects who had been loyally conformist to the Stalinist aesthetic regime were overnight culpable for waste in their superficial embellishments. Not only that, they were disingenuous in claiming the threat of constructivism as a foil for their excesses. Nikita Khrushchev, in his ‘build faster, better, cheaper’ speech to the All Unions Congress of Builders, appeared to have made a volte face conversion to Modernism.29 However, a three-day symposium co-organized by the Union of Soviet Architects and the Union of Soviet Artists in Moscow held nine months earlier appeared to anticipate the question of how the new prefabricated architecture would still be recognizably socialist.30 The meeting renewed the principle of the ‘synthesis of the arts’, which could absorb both Stalinist and Leninist conceptions for art and architecture. Synthesis was present in the socialist realist ideal of the arts as an essential element of architecture, but equally could be traced back to Lenin’s Plan for Monumental Propaganda (said to be inspired by the 1602 utopian work by Tommaso Campanella, ‘City of the Sun’) and its development by Lunacharski. The renewed emphasis on ‘synthesis’ was relayed to German architects and artists in Berlin in 1954 by Soviet art critic, Alexeyevich Fjodorov-Davydov, shortly before Khrushchev’s December speech announcing the shift to industrialized building methods. Fjodorov-Davydov impressed upon his audience the importance of reliefs, sculptures and decorative works (murals, mosaics, ceramic works) in synthesis with architecture, to guarantee the socialist character of architecture.31 Architecture could only make a general statement, but in synthesis with art it could ‘make a much more concrete expression of the socialist spirit of the present: it has a narrative and explanatory character’.32 ‘The task of architecture and fine art’, Fjodorov-Davydov concluded, ‘is to make people’s lives happier, more beautiful, and more comfortable; furthermore, the synthesis of the arts represents a superb medium for the propaganda of progressive ideas, the meaning of creative work, the supremacy of socialism, and the idea of peace between the peoples.’33 Khrushchev’s dramatic December 1954 policy shift to standardized building was not an embrace of Modernism as a cultural force, but of modernization. 29

N. Khrushchev, ‘Remove Shortcomings in Design, Improve the Work of Architects’, 7 December 1954. Russian Archives of Art and Literature (RGALI) 2606/2/361 in Nikolaos Drosos, Phd Dissertation, ‘Modernism with a Human Face: Synthesis of Art and Architecture in Eastern Europe, 1954–1958’ (City University of New York, 2016), 30. 31 A. Fjodorov-Davydov, ‘Die Zusammenarbeit von Architektur und Bildende Kunst’, lecture at the Deutsche Akademie der Künste, 15 October 1954, DA 6/1954, 269. 32 Ibid. 33 Ibid. 30

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Industrialized building, science and technology were a means to modern living and a modern industrial and consumer culture which could also be the basis of Cold War competition. Khrushchev made an enemy of ‘superficial ornament’, but not beauty. Ornament was not evidently always unnecessary, but it should be ‘rational’. He made a claim with a lineage stretching back to Vitruvius, and which was to become a hallmark of Modernism through Adolf Loos, which associated ornament with decadence and fakery. Nikolaos Drosos in his study of the revived synthesis ideal under Khruschev, suggests ornament held a metonymic function in relation to political excess, that de-ornamentation was one of the first and most visible signs of de-Stalinization.34 This was an exhortation to create simpler architecture and represented a significant rejection of the Stalinist aesthetic, but it bore little resemblance to the meanings associated with the stripped aesthetic of the ‘international style’ championed in the USA. Whilst the loss of historicism enabled architects and designers in the GDR to embrace a pared-back aesthetic, ornament was to remain and be reinvented to maintain visual interest, as an indicator of ‘closeness to the people’. It continued to bear significance as realist. Importantly though, ornament was not to depict, as this would bring it closer to abstracted form. But – as Khrushchev was, it seems, well aware – socialist architecture would rely on some kind of inscription in order to visibly identify its socialist credentials. The demand from Khrushchev did not diminish the decorative in art – rather the opposite: it secured a permanent place in industrialized architecture. Whether as decoration or works of art, the idea of ‘synthesis’ was that the arrangement of tectonic structures in which social life took place must also sustain the animation of the surfaces and freestanding sculptures, whether for ideological inscription or for the broader urban design proposal. Socialist realism, closeness to the Party, closeness to the people was not rejected in Khrushchev’s speech, and constructivism (‘technicism’) remained explicitly unacceptable. The mid-1950s pivot from national tradition to standardized architecture resulted in some hybrid practice between the forms and intentions of realism and those of Modernism. Realism, whilst given the form of ‘national tradition’ in the early 1950s, was not inexorably tied to those stylistic idioms. Zhdanov’s definition was of a method and intention to carry ideological content. We can see that it persists through the transition to standardized architecture (and in different ways into the 1970s and 1980s). It is worth remembering here again Zhdanov’s central tenets of realism: parteinost (Party loyalty or partisanship), typichnost (the focus on typical situations rather than the superficial or unreal) and importantly narodnost, meaning ‘of the people’. Narodnost also means national, so there is the link to ‘national tradition’. But in a wider sense, ‘of the people’ can refer to the social purpose of art and architecture. It can refer to the role of the artist and their relationship to working people, to the audience for the works of art and those who are depicted within

34

Drosos, ‘Modernism with a Human Face’, 55.

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them. The principle of partisanship and klassovost (class consciousness) was not present in every work, but the basis for all resolutions was a commitment to the aims of the Party. (The German term Verbundenheit was used throughout the decades to indicate loyalty and political connectedness.) Whatever the aesthetic similarities between what has become known as the Ostmoderne and Western Modernist architecture, these core meanings remained in place and were reinforced through the central place of art within the built environment.

Implementing the realist Modernist hybrid Three examples, less iconic than the prestige Stalinallee, illustrate how the competing how the competing demands on practitioners were resolved in practice. As well as shifting policy, there was also influence through the individuals involved. First, we can consider the new buildings of the Technische Hochschule (TH; Technical College) in Dresden. The reconstruction and expansion of the huge technical college (from 1961 the Technical University) was an urgent priority and reconstruction plans were made as early as 1945. The TH formed its own artistic council for architectural art in 1954, which exercised a degree of autonomy from external authorities and was managed by the graphic artist and sculptor Werner Scheffel, a function he held until 1975.35 The importance attached to the extensive, costly and labour-intensive art programme demonstrates how important these narratives were both for their educational aim and the visual interest they afforded. It is worth remembering how visible public art and ornament would have been, in uncluttered urban landscapes with little visual distraction. The image world at this time (photographs, magazines, advertising) was meagre. The TH was exceptionally well disposed towards the importance of art as part of the overall culture of the scientific and technical education – a plaster relief by Friedrich Press at the entrance to the student housing ‘Prof. Dr Fetscher’ depicts a Kunstdiskussion, discussion about art. Scheffel pursued an enlightened commissioning process, attracting wellestablished Dresden painters, sculptors, graphic artists and applied artists as well as supporting new artists irrespective of their conformity to the artistic political line.36 Around seventy works were commissioned during the 1950s, mainly reliefs and facades, but also Flugwille des Menschens (The Human Will to Flight), a fountain with an elongated Jugendstilesque sculpture by Max Lachnit (Figure 2.6),37 lettering work by Annemarie Willers38 and an ‘astronomical clock’.39 Remaining 35

Kirsch, Kunst im Stadtraum, 63. Realismus und Ostmoderne #2. Erwerbungen und Auftragsarbeiten aus den 1960er Jahren. Brochure, 12–37. 37 Kirsch, Kunst im Stadtraum, 32. 38 Niels-Christian Fritsche, ‘Geschichte der künstlerischen Grundlagenausbildung an der Technischen Universität Dresden’, https://phpweb.tu-dresden.de/Darstellungslehre/geschichte.php. 39 Kirsch, Kunst im Stadtraum, 54. 36

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Figure 2.6 Max Lachnit, ‘Flugwille des Menschens’ (The Human Will to Flight), Dresden, 1958. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Walter Möbius.

funds were used for the university art acquisitions and portraits of rectors and students, including a series of visiting overseas students by Eva Schulz-Knabe. Detail was often seen to be synonymous with realism, and the extent to which artists pushed boundaries through softened contours and stylized forms fluctuated through the 1950s. The first student housing project in Güntzstrasse incorporates Reinhold Langner’s Stadtgeschichte Dresdens (Story of the City of Dresden) (Figure 2.7), a medieval-style alto-relief depicting a great pageant of human struggle from a Marxist-Leninist perspective.40 The original designs were submitted in 1954 and the panels completed in 1957 when national tradition was no longer decisive. Other architectural details combined traditional flora and fauna motifs with depictions of student life as well as inventive pictorializations of technical and scientific principles. In each building the individual style of each 40 For a detailed description of the eleven panels: Simone Simpson, Zwischen Kulturauftrag und künstlerischer Autonomie: Dresdner Plastik der 1950er und 1960er Jahre (Köln: Böhlau, 2008), 179– 93. Güntzpalast. Student Housing, 1953–55, Wolfgang Rauda and Collective. Images of the artworks can be found on Wikicommons.

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Figure 2.7 Wolfgang Rauda, Güntzpalast, (Güntz Palace), Dresden, 1955. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Walter Möbius.

contributing artist is present whilst retaining an overall harmony. In line with the principles of realism, local materials were valued; in Dresden this meant porcelain from Meissen, which was combined with a stone substitute for reliefs made of cement, gravel, sand and water.41 Porcelain was used for mosaic tiles for textilelike patterning (Lachnit, Student canteen, 1959; Eduard Gerhard Claus, Post Office, 1962) as well as combining with other materials such as Nolde and Aschmann’s porcelain copper and enamel ‘Impeller’ which burst across the wall of the staircase landing of the School for Electrical Technology.42 A typical set of reliefs for this period can be seen on the student housing ‘Prof. Dr Fetscher’ in (now) Fritz-Löffler-Strasse (then Reichsstrasse, later Juri-GagarinStraße) in Dresden-Südvorstadt. The architecture (Wolfgang Rauder collective, 1953–5) refers to Dresden Baroque tradition with a sandstone facade and oriel windows. On these oriels, portals and flanking doorways, reliefs depict the ‘typical’ scenes of student life, work and leisure. Although the faculties are all scientific, one relief depicts students in a discussion about art, again impressing the importance of art for all of society. The artistic differences between the five artists, Reinhold Langner, Otto Rost, Max Lachnit, Rudolf Wittig and Herbert Naumann, are clear: some reliefs are intricate, others are economical in form (Figure 2.8). 41

Kirsch, Kunst im Stadtraum, 13. Ibid, 35.

42

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Figure 2.8 Max Lachnit, ‘Lehre und Forschung’ (Teaching and Research), Dresden, 1956/7. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019.

The university complex at Bergstrasse/Zellscher Weg shows further latitude in interpretation. The thematic content also incorporated the new social values (such as equality between men and women), but some of the works demonstrate a tendency towards an economical, rhythmic and graphic form language which was afforded by the materials and techniques and the need to express abstract ideas through iconographic means. An example of this is the series of six etched reliefs relating to the subjects taught on double doors of the Institute for Physics, all from 1957. Here we can see how the elision of realism with abstraction began to make possible new forms of pictoriality in architectural art. The representation of scientific principles affords the possibility of linear, abstracted works such as Magdalene Kreßner’s ‘Corpuscular and Waves Theory’ expressed through through elegant line and geometrical forms, circles and waves. Die vier Elemente in Nature and Technik (The Four Elements in Nature and Technology) by Willhelm Landgraf, depicting a ship, plane and dam using imitation stone relief, recalls the Modernist. Here the symbols of modernity intertwine and are mirrored by fantastical creatures, with transitioning elongated elements reminiscent of Jugendstil. The third set of doors, Rudolf Wittig’s ‘Elementare Erscheinungen der Physik’ divides the space into three sections on each side, depicting a pulley, a screw, a lever and a shaft and, importantly, a male on one side and a female on the other, both engaged in engineering activity, though his grasp and stance is rigorous, hers more gestural.

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Figure 2.9 Magdalene Kreßner, ‘Musizierende Kinder beim Karneval’ (Children Making Music at the Carnival), Dresden, 1955. Photograph © Antje Kirsch.

One of the surprises, because it is clearly abstract, is a set of four pillars on the interior of the Physics building designed by the constructivist artist Hermann Glöckner which form a vertical axis adjacent to a wide spiral staircase. Glöckner worked in the GDR throughout his life, in spite of the official rejection of constructivism or concrete art; this commission was the result of the enlightened approach of Scheffler. The pillars, planned to be in porcelain but realized in plaster, bear a geometric design of primary colours in rectangle and square formations, which overlap to create the relevant subtractive or additive secondary colours. Titled Spektral Analyse (Spectral Analysis), Glöckner’s sketches for the work are now displayed in the Grassi Museum, their significance raised because Glöckner and the commissioner circumvented the expectation of realism. Other interesting works amongst the many examples across the campus demonstrate a modernizing, flowing formal language to carry hybrid messages of gender equality, nature and technology. Sandstone reliefs on the overdoor panel of the Merkel Building by Max Lachnit, Frauen und Technologie (Women and Technology), in a symmetrical composition show women students engaged in scientific activity; out of their hair or head coverings emerge impellers, creating highly unusual half-person/half-machine figures (Figure 2.10). An adjacent overdoor panel sees transitions from natural forms in to the mechanical (Figure 2.11).43

43 Within these buildings many displays of the relevant machines and physical principles set up as learning material still stand.

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Figure 2.10 Max Lachnit, ‘Wissenschaftler und Künstler’ (Scientists and Artists), Merkel Bau, TH, Dresden, 1953/5. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019.

Figure 2.11 As Figure 2.10.

These ideas were an attempt to combine the demand for humanist imagery with a visualization of scientific principles. In the second example, the Hochschule für Bildende und Angewandte Kunst (the School of Fine and Applied Arts) in Berlin Weissensee, completed in 1955, there is a pronounced Modernist tendency in the architecture itself. The site of the art school in a residential area of northern Berlin was intended as a temporary solution whilst a more appropriate site was found. The architect was Selman Selmanagic´, a Bauhaus student of Mies van der Rohe and head of architecture at Weissensee.44 Selmanagic´ sought compromise between the exigencies of the day and his own preference for Bauhaus-influenced architecture and achieved this in part by creating semantic references to the horizontal idiom of Modernism. His design connected an existing three-storey building on the site with a west wing and a north wing. These make concessions to historicism (e.g. tall windows and hipped roofs) but the first impression of the complex is the extended reception section which forms a kind of gallery looking through to the inner

44 Ebert Hildtrud, ‘Der Erweiterungsbau der Kunsthochschule Weissensee’, in Monika Gibas and Peer Pasternack (eds), Bekunstet: Sozialistisch behaust und bekunstet: Hochschulen und ihre Bauten in der DDR (Leipzig: Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 1999).

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courtyard, notably Modernist in its horizontality, transparency and absence of physical hierarchy or boundaries. In the attempt to create a Modernist-style building using acceptable elements of historical style, Selmanagic´’s complex (ironically) becomes a kind of work of art rather than a piece of architecture in which function determines form. Flanking the portico-like entrance are twelve ceramic reliefs (Figures 2.12 and 2.13) depicting scenes from the school of art, the diploma project of Hoyerswerda sculptor Jürgen von Woyski. The artist’s own early form language comes through here more than his technical accomplishment and Woyski’s vignettes – like his later works for Hoyerswerda Zoo – bring a humanist sense of life rather than symbolic figuration (Figure 2.14). A frieze without tectonic function wrapping around the upper strip of the whole reception section around the entrance by Toni Mau is notable for its modish geometric rhythmic line and form. The walls of the canteen in the north wing bear delicate expressive linear drawings of fish and other fauna etched in plaster by Bert Heller, then rector; ceramic plates, Picassoesque in style, painted with humorous images and texts continue the animal theme, giving a homely overall feel to the space.45 On the upper floor, the auditorium is of restrained realist-Modernist elegance, a combination of gentle curves and verticality, with tall windows and wood panelling on the walls and ceiling, and simple brass chandeliers.

Figure 2.12 Jürgen von Woyski, reliefs on the entrance of the Hochschule für Bildende und Angewandte Kunst, Berlin. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019.

45 Ceramic plates by (1) Ernst Rudolf Vogenauer (1955), who had been involved in German expressionism and (2) not identified. Heller’s flora and fauna were painted over in the 1970s, and unfortunately only a few sections behind the canteen tray stacks were restored during the broader restoration project of 2015. The reason given was that the walls should be for students’ art today, although when I visited the walls were not hung with any work.

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Figure 2.13 Entrance portal, Berlin, 1955. Architect: Selman Selmanagic´. Reliefs: As 2.12. Frieze: Toni Mau. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019.

Figure 2.14 Jürgen von Woyski, ‘Kinderreigen’ (Children’s Ring-a-Ring of Roses), Hoyerswerda, 1964. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Kurt Heine.

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In contrast to the hybrid architecture, two murals commissioned by the Kulturfonds conform to the socialist realist ideals of parteinost (Party loyalty) and typichnost (the typical scene). In the reception space before the auditorium, Arno Mohr’s (1910–2001) Wendepunkt (Turning Point) (Plate 2)46 uses a left-to-right narrative to show the development from feudal to socialist relations, with Marx, almost like a family member, in the centre, and on the right the artist himself as an indication that art was integral to the reconstruction. Slightly melancholic, unheroic expressions and stances retain this as an illustration of ordinary life rather than heroic gestures. In its colouring and scaling of figures with the background it recalls the Coit Tower murals in San Francisco. More stylized and rhythmic with bright colours, figures with rounded faces and a very compressed perspective are the figures of Kurt Robbel’s Hafenszene (Harbour Scene) (Plate 4) opposite the second-floor staircase of the west wing. Here the ‘joyfulness’ of productive labour is foregrounded through the vibrant oranges and blues; the people and their smiling faces seem to swing in the same way as the boats on the water behind them; there is a hint of men gossiping about the women as they work. Selmanagic´’s architecture, for all its concessions, has a predominantly light and open feel in comparison to the heavy grey-brown exteriors of the TH institutes in Dresden. In all cases, there is a clear sense of interplay between ideological expectations and the individual artistry of architects and artists. In the background was always the question of Party loyalty and conformity to cultural

Plate 2 Arno Mohr, ‘Wendepunkt’ (Turning Point), Berlin, 1956. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019.

46 Arno Mohr, Wendepunkt, 1956, dry plaster painting, 300 x 900 cm. (Mohr was appointed professor at the school, where he remained for twenty-six years.)

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Plate 4 Kurt Robbel, ‘Hafenszene’ (Harbour Scene), Berlin, 1956. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019.

policy: for all the creativity of Selmanagic´’s architecture, political condemnation always hovered on the horizon; Selmanagic´’s colleagues evidently tried to protect against such an event by distancing themselves from architecture which did not include the so-called sister arts.47 In Dresden, the liberal spirit of Werner Scheffel was also curtailed by a change of rector in the 1960s. Nonetheless Dresden was to see exemplary art and architecture in the 1960s and has been the centre of significant Modernist revival scholarship in recent years. Before moving to the third case, we must return to Stalinstadt (Eisenhüttenstadt). Although the art programme was initially limited to the integration of reliefs and elements within facades, there was an important breakthrough after 1955 when Walter Womacka, on the suggestion of Oskar Nerlinger, was proposed for the role of artistic consultant.48 Womacka’s first major interior mural was a mosaic commissioned for the ‘House of the Parties and Mass Organisations’ (Plates 1 and 3).49 TItled Unser Neues Leben (Our New Life), it anticipated the much larger external work Unser Leben (Our Life) on the Haus des Lehrers

47

Ebert Hildtrud, ‘Der Erweiterungsbau der Kunsthochschule Weissensee’. Walter Womacka association biography, www.fkww.de [accessed 1 October 2013]. 49 The mosaic was celebrated with a DEFA film, Ein Bild aus 100.000 Steinen (Dokumentation der Arbeiten zum Mosaik im Rathaus Eisenhüttenstadt, DEFA, 1958) which emphasized the relationship of the work to the new life of people that was emerging in the city. At this time, the artist was not given any special status or even named, but was considered alongside the technical workers who created the artwork and constructed the building. 48

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Plate 1 Walter Womacka, ‘Unser Neues Leben’ (Our New Life), Eisenhüttenstadt, 1956/58. Photograph © Martin Maleschka 2020.

Plate 3 Detail of ‘Unser Neues Leben’. Photograph © Martin Maleschka 2020.

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(see introduction). Womacka also created bright, bold stained-glass windows for the staircase of the 1953 Kindergarten II in Living Complex II, Eisenhüttenstadt. This work was divided into sections which suited the graphic vignettes at which Womacka excelled. Unser Leben by contrast was a linear narrative work placed within a difficult space. Womacka succeeded in exploting the spatial possibilities of the mural, as distinct from the easel painting. In a later mural on the textile Kaufhaus, he was even more bold in his graphics; here narrative content was placed within larger parts of the image, creating a bold Mexican-style simultaneous narrative (Plates 13 and 14).50 The third example of this hybrid realist Modernism is the first experiment in building a whole town using standardized building elements. This was Hoyerswerda, planned twelve kilometres east of the brown coal processing plant, Schwarze Pumpe, which was the second important industrial centre after Stalinstadt/Eisenhüttenstadt. Situated in Lausitz region, Hoyerswerda was in the

Plate 13 Walter Womacka, ‘Gemeinschaftsarbeit der sozialistischen Länder’ (Collective Work of Socialist Countries), Eisenhüttenstadt, 1965. Photograph © Gottfried Hoffmann 2008.

50 Womacka was the most prominent mural artist in the GDR. For an exposé of his life and work, see Luise Helas, ‘Walter Womacka. Sein Beitrag zur architekturbezogene Kunst in der DDR’, in Kunstvolle Oberflächen, 2014.

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Plate 14 Detail of ‘Gemeinschaftsarbeit der sozialistischen Länder’, Walter Womacka. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2010.

Plate 16 Fritz Eisel, ‘Die Berg- und Energiearbeiter der Region’ (The Miners and Energy Workers of the Region), Hoyerswerda, 1984. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013.

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Plate 17 View of ‘Die Berg- und Energiearbeiter der Region’ on the ‘Haus der Berg- und Energiearbeiter’, the House of the Miners and Energy Workers. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013.

territory of the west Slavic ethnic group the the Sorbs, a fact which offered the possibility to appropriate ethnic tradtion in line with socialist realist principles. Architect Richard Paulick commissioned a report into the potential appropriation of Sorb culture within Blockbauweise (block building method), which preceded building completely with prefabricated elements.51 The report’s author, G. Blume, repeatedly underlined – and romanticized – the authentic qualities of Sorb communities as indicative of the natural sense of working-class solidarity and their affinity to nature and craft. Blume proposed replicating the traditional Umgebindehaus, a ‘half-timber’ construction with prefabricated building methods. The folk arts of the Sorbs could also be appropriated for the decorative facades through using moulds to colour the slabs.52 A similar kind of historically referencing, prefabricated architecture was eventually introduced in the GDR in the 1980s, with the same premise that it would allow for economical building and offer a sense of local connectedness. No doubt in deference to the new emphasis on economy, the Sorbian idea was abandoned. At a meeting on 25 January 1956, Paulick concluded that ‘the Sorb programme’ (in general terms) was too costly per head of population. Without the Sorb programme, the chief architect of the first two living complexes in Hoyerswerda (1955–6), Ferdinand Rupp actively encouraged artists to come to the town to assist with its cultural development and artistic design as part of the Aufbau Stab (construction task force).53 Two of the first artists to arrive were Kurt Heinz Sieger and Peter Bathke. Like many of his

51

G. Blume, ‘Ausarbeitung über sorbische Kunst zur Gestaltung der Großplattenbauweise in Hoyerswerda’, 27.01.1956, BArch, DH 2/23646. 52 Ibid. 53 Jürgen von Woyski, ‘Der Bildhauer und seine Stadt’, in Sächsische Heimat Blätter, 4/98, 248–55.

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generation, Sieger’s childhood was marked by social upheaval and poverty; it was the founding of the GDR which gave him the opportunity to attend art school. After training as a decorative artist, he attended the Dresden Academy of Art where he specialized in mural painting and fine art. Peter Bathke had graduated from the School for Applied Arts in Heiligendamm, 400 kilometres north of Hoyerswerda on the Baltic coast. Both were delegated to Hoyerswerda. Rupp’s collective was joined in 1955 by the sculptor Jürgen von Woyski, newly graduated from Berlin Weissensee,54 Karl-Heinz Steinbrück from Heiligendamm, and in 1959 by the metal artist55 Manfred Vollmert, who had studied with the Bauhaus artist Karl Müller at Burg Giebichenstein in Halle. Vollmert was directed to Hoyerswerda through the student work agency in Halle. Peter Bathke’s recollections from 2002 give an insight into this process, and how the artistic group neue form came in to being. I had to go to the chief architect [Rupp] and he was happy to have someone who could pepper up the buildings. ‘Think of something’, he said. ‘Here is a room and you will get a contract. Get yourself some people to help. You can’t do it on your own.’ In the meantime, a few other people applied, a painter and a sculptor. I got hold of some blacksmiths. Then we realised what a lot we had taken on. We needed a workshop . . . I told the Guild in Cottbus, ‘Listen, we are two painters and two blacksmiths, and I am in charge because I have the craft qualification’ . . . I was told that because of socialist developments we should become a production cooperative . . . It was a fantastic beginning, but not easy. Very quickly we became very big, and we did interiors, painted facades, all kinds of metalwork, entrances, terraces . . . We got lots of money from the regional council, said that these were important things that we were doing, and that it improved the image of the DDR . . . then we got the material quotas we needed. We got everyone from the council on our side . . .56 Bathke goes on to describe Rupp’s enlightened approach which motivated the artists. Woyski also recalled in 2002 that when commissioned to create his first work in Hoyerswerda, a female figure, Rupp did not expect the artists to reproduce socialist realist stereotypes, and said he wanted ‘no heavy-busted activist’. Woyski describes Die Tänzerin (The Dancer) as ‘a pretty, slight girl,

54

Ibid, 248–55. A Metalgestalter (metal designer) is hard to translate, as the emphasis on the material specialism defies easy categorization as an artist, craftsperson or designer. Vollmert can be considered to be all of these. 56 Arielle Kohlschmidt and René Beder, Mit handwerklichem Gruß: Geschichte der letzten 50 Jahre des südbrandenburgischen Handwerks (Cottbus: CGA, 2002). 55

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which in the anticipation of a beautiful evening already dances and her skirt swings. Her optimistic mood . . . shows something of the spirit of those years.’57 The artists chose a range of the motifs to decorate the new architecture, though none included human figuration: they referred to nature, still life, folk tales, Der Froschkönig, Der Hase und der Igel (The Frog King, The Hare and the Hedgehog) and sometimes geometric abstract patterns. One of the series has a Jugendstil stylization with repeated elongated forms. Only one series by Sieger depicted the coal mining industry, but in a style that was more reminiscent of children’s toys than the heat, muscles and sweat of the stereotypical socialist realist painting of the industrial scene. The expression of each artist is evident in the works, as they applied the techniques of sgraffito, mosaic, and glass work across the entrances and around the windows of the first development around the station. The works created by the neue form artists, none of whom came from the Lausitz region, attempted to foster a sense of Heimatsgefühl (identification with home and locality) for the new residents, with references to the landscape and wildlife of the Lausitz region. The narrative elements within the first living complexes – simple, even naïve, and picturesque – and forms integrated into the metal railings on balconies and window ledges used a vocabulary of contemporaneous Modernist form design – flat form and colour, modishly tapered, off-centred, asymmetric with a pronounced geometrical stylization – and at the same time conformed to socialist realist aesthetic categories (Figures 2.15, 2.16 and 2.17). The narrative pieces were not pedagogical in relaying the new social order, but some tended to popular spirit (narodnost or Volkstümlichkeit in German) in offering connections with the local landscape, with the new industry and with folk tales. Moreover, whilst not grandiose, they were intended to bring beauty to an architecture around which a great deal of anxiety over potential monotony existed. On 1 May 1958, four members of Rupp’s artists’ collective formalized themselves as the künstlerische Produktionsgenossenschaft neue form.58 The cooperative set up an improvised workshop in Seidewinkel in which the specialisms in metal, wood, goldsmithing and enamel were practised. Neue form, besides taking on commissions which brought together craft skills, form design, sculpture and architectural art, also became a recognized centre for training new artist craftspeople, employing at its height over fifty people.59 It was to develop not just as a centre for artistic craft but also as a circle of artists and intellectuals including the writer Brigitte Reimann, who was to have an important influence on debates about the new urbanism.

57

von Woyski, ‘Der Bildhauer und seine Stadt’, 248. The four founding members were Peter Bathke, Karl-Heinz Steinbrück, Wolfgang Nötzold and Herbert Morys. 59 Information from Peter Bathke (ed.), KPG neue form (Cottbus: Rat des Bezirkes Cottbus, Abteilung Kultur, 1988), and correspondence with Manfred Vollmert. 58

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Figure 2.15 Kurt Heinz Sieger, Hoyerswerda, 1959. © Archiv Kurt Heinz Sieger.

Figure 2.16 Kurt Heinz Sieger, Eisenhüttenstadt, 1961. © Archiv Kurt Heinz Sieger.

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The cooperative saw itself as working in the Bauhaus spirit in its unity of art, craft and industry, but aside from the lower-case name of the cooperative, this could only be explicit the late 1980s.60 Bathke, who stayed with the group until its end in 1990, described a ‘fascination’ with the new building technology: ‘For us, the results of this new way of building was a declaration of the fight against the Weberweise [a reference to socialist realist Stalinallee] architecture which still dominated – the showpiece architecture of over-valued ornament.’61 Although Bathke appeared to use the word ornament pejoratively here, it was ornament which both formed the foundation for the cooperative and which made up the basis of the later restoration commissions in the 1980s.

Figure 2.17 Karl-Heinz Steinbrück and Herbert Morys, Hoyerswerda, 1956. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013.

60

KPG neue form, 1988. Ibid.

61

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The mythic status of Hoyerswerda as a failure of urbanity In the 1960s, the expansion of Hoyerswerda’s new living complexes stretched away from Rupp’s first living complexes in the old town area to the clean territory across the Spremberger river under the new direction of Richard Paulick. The new complexes were subject to ever greater economies of investment and architectural form, which saw not only a gradual loss of architectural detailing, but an increasingly repetitive urban landscape. With the pressure on schedules and budgets, planned cultural facilities failed to emerge. Hoyerswerda was to become associated not with the successes of the block building method, Sorbian culture, or the innovations of neue form, but for the interventions of the writer, Brigitte Reimann, who openly criticized the social experience of the new urban landscapes. Reimann had arrived in Hoyerswerda as part of the Bitterfelder Weg programme, which put artists and writers to work in factories.62 Reimann began to correspond with authoritative figures such as architect Hermann Henselmann63 and the influential cultural functionary Alfred Kurella,64 using a style of naivety which belied her intellect, but which evidently captured the sentiments of these paternal figures, including Walter Ulbricht himself.65 This seeming (or affected) naivety allowed Reimann to ask questions publicly and privately that perhaps others would not have dared to. In 1963, she shared her boredom and frustration with Kurella at the demands made of her for the socialist realist novel and the expectations of the brigade leaders in the factory where she was assigned to work: I cannot work in the conditions of the factory, brass music through the loudspeakers all the time, and meetings with the workers and functionaries who look for explanations all the time . . . I am depressed, and maybe you would understand if you lived here for a while, or at least once took part in such a discussion as yesterday.66 62 The Bitterfelder Weg principles were abandoned after the VIII Party Congress in 1971, when Erich Honecker took office. 63 The letters are published as Mit Respekt und Vergnügen: Briefwechsel (Berlin: Neues Leben, 1974). 64 Brigitte Reimann, letter to Alfred Kurella, correspondence Hoyerswerda, Berlin; 26.05.1963 – 02.05.1965, 14.06.63, Arch. AdK 2168. 65 Reimann’s account was corroborated in conversation with Helene and Martin Schmidt, who belonged to the circle around Reimann and neue form: conversation with Helene und Martin Schmidt 12.04.12, authors of Brigitte Reimann, Begegnungen und Erinnerungen, 2006 and Was ich auf dem Herzen habe, Begegnungen mit Brigitte Reimann – Zeitzeugen berichten, 2008. Together with other young people, the Schmidts, eager for the culture that was absent in Hoyerswerda, founded the Hoyerswerdaer Kunstverein – Freundeskreis der Künste und Literatur in 1963 to discuss art and literature. 66 Brigitte Reimann, letter to Alfred Kurella, 14.6.63. correspondence Hoyerswerda, Berlin, Arch. AdK 2168.

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Reimann also used the architect protagonist in her novel Franziska Linkerhand (1973) to voice doubts about the new urbanity. These echoed the concerns of Theodor Adorno and Ernst Bloch in the 1930s that the new urbanism was similar to the privation and alienation of the nineteenth century tenements but with a new facade.67 Over the plans for Hoyerswerda and all future housing projects hovered the spectre of monotony and loss of local identity. The term monotony was openly used in architectural debates, but it was not explicitly identified as relating to alienation as well as visual repetition. Works of art and applied art were to be not only ideologically significant but were to perform the more mundane function of optical relief. In 1963, Reimann posed the audacious question in the GDR National Council, ‘Can one kiss in Hoyerswerda?’ and followed it with a piece in the local newspaper, the Lausitzer Rundschau.68 The question implied that the new environment was sterile, and it stimulated a debate in the Lausitzer Rundschau as well as a citizens’ meeting, in which residents aired their discontent over the ‘bleakness and boringness’69 of their surroundings. Reimann’s public interventions provided Bruno Flierl (b. 1927), the then editor of the professional architects’ journal Deutsche Architektur, a discursive opening. Flierl had left West Berlin after graduating as an architect in 1948 in order to actively develop architectural theory and practice in the new socialist state and was editor of Deutsche Architektur from 1962 to 1964, where he used his brief tenure to try to reform ideas of socialist architecture. Flierl brought the debate in the Lausitzer Rundschau to the attention of his architect colleagues and proposed that architects should assert their creativity in designing urban ensembles using industrialized methods, to respond to the need for intimate and varied spaces. Nonetheless, he suggested that some of the residents’ criticisms resulted from ‘misunderstandings and undeveloped knowledge’.70 Flierl also published a highly critical letter to the editor from a resident of Hoyerswerda who addressed the central question of the socialist nature of the new architecture: This problem cannot be solved through the assurance that we are in agreement on the general questions, that we unite under the formula: socialist building is economical building, which does not clarify of the question, what is the understanding of economic in socialist architecture? Which are the specifically

67 Curtis Swope, Building Socialism, Architecture and Urbanism in East German Literature, 1955–1973 (London: Bloomsbury, 2017), 174. 68 Brigitte Reimann, ‘Bemerkungen zu einer neuen Stadt’, Lausitzer Rundschau, 27.08.1963. 69 Bruno Flierl, ‘Hoyerswerda und die Entwicklung des sozialistischen Lebens’, first published in DA 4/ 1964, 217–18, and in edited form in Architektur und Kunst, 9–14. 70 Ibid.

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socialist agencies of architecture? What is the socialist consciousness, the socialist relationships between people, the spiritual life of a people?71 A debate was opened up about the qualities of the urban ensembles emerging through standardized building. The retreat from national tradition was not Modernism as it had been appropriated by the West, even as the stylistic idioms of Modernism were becoming accepted in design in architecture. The architectural debate had to shift away from aesthetics and develop an understanding of the lived experience of the new architecture.

71

Hans Kerschek, Letter to the Editor, DA 4/1964, 220. Kerschek, ‘ordinary resident’ who wrote the letter after attending the ninth Plenum of the Building Academy, was in fact the partner of Reimann, and the views he expressed as an ordinary resident coincided with those of Reimann and Flierl.

PART TWO

Developing a Realist Modernism (1959 to 1973)

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Chapter 3 Reconceptualizing the Place of Art in the System-built Environment

Architecture, as both the physical realization of and metaphor for socialist reconstruction, was the most ideologically laden of the artistic or design disciplines. The task of theorizing the shift to economical building methods in what had been claimed as ‘the highest form of art’ in 1952 was correspondingly onerous.1 Khrushchev’s directive to ‘build better, cheaper and faster’ in December 1954 did not constitute a theory, and in the Soviet Union too, the pragmatic approach did not remove the necessity for theoretical foundations.2 As the GDR entered the 1960s with the promise of new ways of living enabled by science and technology, synthetics and design, it also had to reconceptualize the fields of architecture as it departed from art, and design as it departed from craft. In the struggle for the socialist character of architecture and the built environment, realists (or conservatives) were pitted against modernizers. In all of these disputes, the principle of socialist art and architecture remained, and change had to be argued through re-conceptualizing indisputable principles, one of which was ‘beauty’ – never clearly defined but used rhetorically to mean different things. Peripheral as it appears in the scholarship on East German art and architecture, architectural art emerged as an ideological glue which could in some way hold these competing interests together.

1

Kurt Liebknecht, president of the Deutsche Bauakademie and Edmund Collein, vice president of the Bauakademie, Guidelines set out at the first German Architects’ Congress, Berlin, December, 1951, published as ‘Fragen der deutschen Architektur und des Städtebaus’ (Berlin: Henschelverlag, 1952). 2 Catherine Cooke, with Susan Reid, ‘Modernity and Realism: Architectural Relations in the Cold War’, in Susan Emily Reid and Rosalind P. Blakesley (eds), Russian Art and the West: A Century of Dialogue in Painting, Architecture, and the Decorative Arts (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2007), 183–6.

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The future for art in architecture – reform and resistance Whilst both architecture and design required theoretical manoeuvring to release them from the ‘critical appropriation of national tradition’, for architecture the adoption of industrialized system building to achieve rapid construction appeared as not only an ideological renunciation but as a threat to the profession of architect. President of the BdA, Hanns Hopp described architects in the late 1950s as ‘staring like rabbits into the headlights’.3 As in the Soviet Union, a key trigger for change was the publication of Alexander Burow’s The Aesthetic Essence of Art in 1958.4 Although not primarily concerned with architecture, Burow’s book was provocative in architectural circles because it released architecture from the realm of art, and proposed that architecture was equivalent to industrial design. Drawing on Khrushchev’s 1954 speech, Burow claimed: ‘The Soviet people want . . . functional beauty.’5 For Burow, decoration could not be an end in itself.6 The incontestable idea of ‘beauty’, which lent itself to both material and immaterial conceptions, was, as in form design, to be a rhetorical or conceptual device allowing the transition to a functional approach to architecture.

Hans Schmidt and the development of theoretical approaches In the wake of Khrushchev’s 1954 speech, the journal Deutsche Architektur had focused on technical rather than ideological questions around industrialized building. This lacuna was brought to an end through the influence of the incoming Basel architect and theorist, Hans Schmidt.7 Schmidt was appointed ‘to help push through industrialised building as the new material-technical basis of architecture in the GDR, both theoretically, and as a practical, creative task’.8 He had been a pioneer in the Neues Bauen movement and co-founder of the manifesto journal, ABC: Contributions to Building, with Mart Stam, El Lissitzky and Emil Roth in 1924. ABC had posited architecture as central to social revolution, and put social function at the centre of a new architecture based on

3

Hanns Hopp, cited by Simone Hain, ‘ABC und DDR’, 1996, 441, footnote 31. A. J. Burow, Das ästhetische Wesen der Kunst, trans. from the Russian by Ullrich Kuhirt (Berlin: Dietz, 1958). 5 Ibid, 265. 6 Ibid. Decoration must not be ‘Selbstzweck’ (a function in its own right), 266. Burow was also extensively criticized in Deutsche Architektur. 7 Hain, ‘ABC und DDR’, 441. 8 Bruno Flierl, ‘Hans Schmidt in der DDR, Reflexionen in der DDR’, in Gebaute DDR. Über Städtpläner, Architekten und die Macht (Berlin: Verlag für Bauwesen, 1998), 76–92, 77. 4

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order and regulation, in which ‘sentimental feelings for the piety of production from previous eras and individual form virtuosity’ had no place.9 Modern architecture was to be ‘unconcerned with efforts towards a formal beauty’.10 This functionalist architecture had no place for art or the idea of architecture as a form of creative expression, and was thus incompatible with socialist realism. In 1958, Schmidt was appointed director of the Institute for Theory and History at the Bauakademie where he formed alliances with reform-minded architects and theorists. Two of the modernizers were Kurt Junghanns (architect and author, and Bruno Flierl, both committed socialists interested in advancing architectural theory through appropriating some of the ideas of interwar Modernism. For Flierl, the arrival of Schmidt, a modernizer committed to socialism, opened the way for developing architecture theory. In 1958, together with Junghanns and Flierl, Schmidt proposed a conference on ‘the foundations and tasks of a socialist architecture theory’, later revised to a two-day seminar from 25 to 26 July 1959 at the Bauakademie, inviting both reform-minded architects as well as realists or conservatives who emphasized the artistic nature of architecture (usually referred to as ‘ideologues’ or ‘hardliners’ in literature because they prioritized ideology). There were eighty-nine participants including Gerhard Kosel from the Building Ministry, Ule Lammert from the SED, Gerhard Trölitzsch and Gerhard Krenz from the Central Committee (ZK), Kurt Liebknecht, Edmund Collein and Richard Paulick from the Building Academy, Christian Schädlich, Lothar Kühne and Selman Selmanagic´, as well as Hermann Exner and Franz Ehrlich.11 Schmidt, Flierl and Junghanns knew that this would be a fractious debate. It is evident from the draft proposals, in which the significance of the artistic nature of architecture was continually revised by the conveners, that it was critical to pitch the redefinition of architecture away from Baukunst with care. Reformers wanted to shift the conception of architecture to one which was organized around its socially functional tasks, liberating it from the domain of ‘art’. At the same time, conservatives would insist that only the ‘artistic’ socialist realist conception would guarantee its distinction from capitalist architecture. Kurt

9

Mart Stam, Hans Schmidt, El Lissitzky and Emil Roth, ABC Beiträge zum Bauen, 1924–1928, Issue 1, 1, Basel. 10 Ibid, Issue 2, 4. 11 ‘Vorbereitendes Material zur Theoretischen Beratung des Instituts für Theorie und Geschichte der Baukunst der Deutschen Bauakademie – Thesen zum Referat’, in ‘Konferenz über Grundlagen und Aufgaben einer sozialistischen Architekturtheorie’, DH2/21201, 1–3. The idea for a theory conference arose originally from the 35th Plenum of the ZK in which Honecker had claimed that that whilst the main problems of socialist culture had been clarified (a socialist-realist culture and the first Bitterfeld Conference), many particular problems had remained in the background. As a result, the III Congress of the BdA had requested the leading committee of the Bauakademie to set up a conference on socialist realism in architecture. DA , 1958/I, 280. The initiative of Junghanns, Flierl and Schmidt is important in their interpretation of the framework proposed.

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Liebknecht clearly positioned himself in the latter camp, saying discussion was overdue because of ‘revisionist attitudes influenced by the West’ since 1956. At the same time, he explained away the era of the national tradition as characterized by ‘a one-sided narrow interpretation of particular teachings of Marxist aesthetics and their dogmatic application’. The organizers’ aim was, in view of the extensive industrialization to be rolled out by 1965, to find a conception in which ‘architects can create a socialist environment in which socialist life in material and ideals can completely unfold’. Thus, already in the conception, there was a move to a social functional understanding of architecture as the built environment in which socialist life unfolded. Schmidt had undoubtedly shifted from his radical functionalist position since the ABC years, which represented a conception of architecture that would have been completely untenable politically in the GDR. Most issues of the ABC had pursued a general anti-art polemic with the exception of the 2/1926 issue,12 devoted exclusively to the exploration of constructivist art and the new typography propagated by Jan Tschichold. Bauhaus teacher and later director, Hannes Meyer had been invited to guest edit the issue, but later complained that he had been hoodwinked into writing about art by the ‘super functionalists’ Schmidt et al.13 Twenty-five years later, Schmidt’s account was that Meyer ‘was interested in the use of new artistic means such as theatre, graphics and photography for propagating new social ideas’, but that Meyer’s ideas represented ‘an extreme, so to speak “automatic” functionalism’.14 Meyer’s difficulties with accepting art as a part of architecture had led to his complete censure in the GDR (he was rehabilitated, thanks to the determined work of Kurt Junghanns, in the 1980s), whilst Schmidt, a fellow Basler, worked to a middle path to define socialist architecture. In his 1959 conference address, Schmidt proposed that the new architecture would be drawn from the new socialist consciousness, which was unfolding, which would be expressed ‘in the given elemental forms of building’. The material production of society was primary, because consciousness could only change in line with ‘being’ (sein), although both material production and artistic production were ‘inextricably linked’. The artistic forms which Schmidt saw as emerging were based on making beautiful the principle of ‘truthfulness’.

12

ABC Beiträge zum Bauen, 1924–1928, ‘Abstract Art’ No. 2, Series 2, Basel, 1926. In 1947, Meyer bitterly complained that he had been betrayed by the editors of ABC who had ‘signed [Meyer] as editor because the anti-art super functionalists Stam, Schmidt etc. officially wanted to distance themselves [from art]’. Letter from Hannes Meyer to Paul Artaria, Mexico, 3.3.1947. From the estate of Hannes Meyer, Sammlung Deutsches Architektur Museum, Frankfurt am Main, quoted by Werner Möller in ‘Useless Beauty’, in Lars Miller, Commentary to ABC , Baden, 1993, 37. 14 ‘Der Architekt Hannes Meyer’, in Dezennium 2, Zwanzig Jahre Verlag der Kunst Dresden (Dresden: Verlag der Kunst, 1972), 263–76, 263. In his account here, a review of Meyer’s biography, Schmidt only refers to Die Neue Welt, a special issue of the periodical ‘Das Werk’, No. 7/1926, Zurich, a cross-section of European Modernism, rather than the issue of ABC on constructivist art, published also in 1926. 13

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Architecture was ‘a branch of artistic production’, in that it had to ‘serve the ideal needs of society’. In this rather roundabout way, Schmidt effectively differentiated the aesthetics of architecture (based on classical principles of order, harmony, rhythm, clarity and so on) from the artistic content, which was present in the functional organization as it reflected societal ideals, and the ‘new socialist consciousness’.15 Thus, the mimetic function of art in socialist realism was dematerialized, to reappear within socialist consciousness. Junghanns’s proposal went even further in its emphasis on material production, and did not mention art at all, but ‘new forms of expression . . . arising from the new socialist consciousness’. Junghanns went furthest in embracing the technological aspect of the new architecture, claiming that ‘false attitudes which see in industrialisation a technical, economical violation’ of architecture must be ‘corrected’. There was a clear difference (i.e. no ‘convergence’) from capitalist architecture because the economic and ideological conditions were different.16 In Junghanns’s argument there need be no visible difference between socialist and capitalist architecture. Flierl upturned the notion of socialist aesthetics as a simple ‘reflection’ of reality: ‘Production does not only offer a material to meet needs, it offers the material also a need. Production does not only produce an object for its subject but also a subject for its object.’ In other words, the dynamic relationship was not between the architect and the working class, as an artistic ‘reflection’ of society, but the new architecture itself would change consciousness.

The appearance of the new built environment The arguments proposed by Schmidt, Junghanns and Flierl rested on the socialist ‘art’ content of the new architecture as arising from socialist consciousness and relations. This was a subtle change from architecture as art to architecture using artistic means and incorporating works of art. Serially produced building offered new tasks in ‘the ordering, plans, physicality, the new surfaces, ornament and colour, not to mention the use of artworks, particularly sculpture’. Our task, Schmidt reminded his audience, ‘is to express the clear, logical and healthy’. Beauty was hard to define, he conceded, and it had to begin with Zweckmässigkeit (functionality) but he was optimistic that ‘new forms of building, people’s changed way of living, and their new relationship to nature, the changing role of transport, [would give] new means and possibilities to develop beauty’.17 In trying to imagine how this might appear, Flierl suggested: ‘I can imagine that we will develop slabs which will allow all sorts of visual representations, even 15

Schmidt, ‘Vorbereitendes Material zur Theoretischen Beratung’. Kurt Junghanns, ibid. 17 ‘Konferenz über Grundlagen und Aufgaben einer sozialistischen Architekturtheorie’, DH2/21201, 1–3. 16

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made of artificial materials.’18 Flierl seemed to suggest the kinds of solution proposed by Blume in relation to Hoyerswerda. The ‘visual representations’ already pointed to the need for some kind of socialist inscription within the slab. It is important to note that in the developing ideas of modernizers, socialist realism was not rhetorically rejected, and Modernism was not rhetorically embraced. The aim was to make a connection between the principles of realism in its premise of being close to the people, uplifting, and fit for socialist life processes and a functionalist, technological, economical approach to building, not determined by historical symbolism.

Resistance to Schmidt’s conception For conservatives at the conference this was all insufficiently Marxist, and insufficiently beautiful. Kurt Magritz and others feared that architecture was going to lose its specific art – and hence socialist – value, and its beauty. For Magritz, beauty had a primacy in realistic art, and it must be named. It cannot be left to go under . . . The development of beauty in socialist life is the basis for the blossoming of a realistic art in socialism. Thus, principally all architects have the possibility to create a beautiful architecture in the artistic sense. In his summing up, Alfred Kurella, at that time leader of the culture commission of the Politbüro, detected a ‘puritanical streak’ in Schmidt’s conception. ‘But our socialist society is not puritanical and will be even less so in the future.’ Not enough had been said about fine art, about painted and sculptural decoration, moving or permanent, wall fixed or free-standing. Art in architecture was too important to be left to the decorative painter, Kurella claimed, and mused that it would be nice to find the quality of the Renaissance artists in the GDR. Whilst most contributions were printed in edited form in Deutsche Architektur, Kurella’s was selected for publication in the national newspaper, Neues Deutschland. For the general public at least, architecture would remain a form of art.

Socialist beauty between art, the Bauhaus and dematerialization There seemed to be so little consensus at the 1959 conference that, according to Hans Hopp, the only agreement was ‘to build the most beautiful homes and

18

Ibid.

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the best apartments, which present the clearest reflection of our new socialist relationships’.19 Recognizing the lack of progress, the organizers suggested a series of small conferences to run every few months, each dealing with a different aspect – something that was ultimately achieved in another form in 1968 with the setting up of the joint working group of the artists and artists unions, the ZAG. Schmidt’s case was helped by an intervention by Jirˇ í Gocˇár, president of the Czechoslovakian Architects Union, who was invited to speak to members of the Bauakademie in Berlin in March 1960 before the next theory conference.20 His arguments helped to advance a definition of socialist architecture through its relationship to culture. Socialist architecture, he argued, was characterized by ‘Parteilichkeit [Party-mindedness], scientific foundations, radical technical change, and emphasis on the cultural side of [our] activity’.21 Gocˇ ár addressed the art/architecture discussion by effectively allowing for their separation. Architecture was a part of socialist culture which was a higher category, in which art was included. This was not to deny the significance of artistic means in architecture, which could be ‘analogue to the methods of other arts, using order, rhythm, heightening, counterpoint, symmetry, asymmetry’, but to relocate socialist meaning within a wider context. Gocˇ ár transitioned the socialist content of architecture into the socialist culture, the aesthetics of architecture essentially being design questions.22 With this intervention, Magritz and other stalwarts of realism found themselves on the defensive. Schmidt, Flierl and Junghanns pressed ahead with their socially rather than artistically derived conceptions of socialist architecture in their presentations for the 1960 conference. But in spite of the potential shift towards the ideas of Schmidt and Flierl, they chose to absorb much of the language of the ideals of their critics, in particular to assert the importance of ‘beauty’ and the role of art. Schmidt decided to place a greater emphasis on beauty as the product of socialist work. Socialism, he proposed, allowed the city ‘not only economically, technically and functionally to be fulfilled, but the city as a product of human work to be created according to the objective laws of beauty’ (Karl Marx).23 Industrialized building in the conditions of socialism, would offer ‘a new kind of beauty determined by its functionality (Zweckmässigkeit), clarity, lightness and precision, and is in harmony with other areas of industrial production

19

Ibid. Jirˇ i Gocˇ ár, ‘Gegenwartsfragen der tschecholslowakischen Architekturentwicklung’. A shortened version of his speech was reproduced as a special supplement to to DA/9. 21 Ibid, 7. 22 Gocˇ ár, ‘Gegenwartsfragen’. 23 ‘Konferenz über Grundlagen und Aufgaben einer sozialistischen Architekturtheorie’, DH2/21201, 1–3. 20

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which aesthetically form our environment’.24 Works of art, barely mentioned at the original conference, were to be central in the formation of this new beauty. Schmidt claimed that ‘The beauty of the socialist city will also be increased and enriched through works of art’ and works of art ‘also fulfil important educational, ideal and cultural functions’.25 The conference proposal suggested that works of art within the urban landscape would take up an ideological function where the industrialized architecture was inadequate. Where architecture was unable to express the ideals and ideas of society, it would rely on co-existence of art (sculpture, painting) ‘to which falls the task of giving concrete, ideological representative expression’.26 Thus, rather than being less important, art was to be all the more important. This was a tacit acknowledgement that public art was going to take on the visual artistic, ideological function where serialized, slabbed building seemed inadequate to do so, and furthermore that the positioning of art within urban ensembles was to assist in the ‘staging’ and articulation of those spaces. The approach of Schmidt and Flierl was to move away from considering the form of buildings towards the larger conception of the complex of the urban plan, the functions of buildings and the socialist life that would take place within them. Aesthetically these should nonetheless continue to project a visibly socialist ‘difference’, through harmonious planning of public space, the accenting of spaces and buildings through works of art and means of design, and through the direct pedagogical and ideological function of the works of art themselves. For art to become a functional element amongst many within the urban plan was a considerable demotion, but it remained an essential part of the new socialist built environment, alongside other elements such as colour and surface articulation. Increasingly, as the idea of complexity developed, new elements of design became important, such as features of nature, colour, lighting, street furnishings and visual communications. Schmidt was careful not to refer explicitly to the interwar avant-garde of which he had been part, but, with his embrace of a distinctly Modernist aesthetic vision as he wrested architecture away from ‘national tradition’ and Baukunst, he found himself fighting on two fronts. One of the most vocal opponents of expanding the remit of socialist realism in what he claimed was a throwback to the Bauhaus was Herbert Letsch.27 Letsch held to an orthodox socialist realist position which

24

Ibid. Ibid. 26 Ibid. 27 Letsch was probably still a student at this time. In 1965 he published his doctoral thesis, which is an extended argument against the ‘technicism’ of the Bauhaus. Later, in Hagen Bächler, Herbert Letsch and Karla Scharf, Ästhetik, Mensch, Gestaltete Umwelt (Berlin: Verlag der Wissenschaften, 1982), he moderated his position. 25

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saw the Bauhaus as an essentially bourgeois endeavour that fetishized technology without any real (socialist) ideals.28 Schmidt, no doubt with a view not only to the ongoing rejection of the Bauhaus heritage in the GDR, but also its international transition into a modish style free of any kind of social value, repeatedly distanced himself from Modernist abstraction in art and design. But his asceticism pleased neither those who feared a creeping functionalism, such as Letsch, nor those who favoured the concept of architecture as a pleasurable experience. However, Schmidt condemned equally any form of appeal to sentiment through playful experiment in form and colour – in other words, the kind of ‘formalism’ implied by Letsch. In Schmidt’s view such aestheticism was present in the work of Frank Ehrlich, the architect, interior designer and furniture designer and former Bauhaus student. In a lecture at the Haus der Kultur in Stalinallee, Berlin in 1957,29 Ehrlich defended the artistic content of architecture, and ‘the right of the working person to beauty and art within architecture’.30 At the 1959 conference, he had argued that the aesthetic function of architecture was ‘the spatial optical experience’.31 But the idea of an architecture determined by something as whimsical as spatial experience was anathema to most of the leading architects, who sought an absolute determinant for socialist architecture. Ehrlich’s work was consistently defended by the critic, Hermann Exner on the basis that it had a popular and thus socialist appeal. Exner described the interior of the Klub der Kulturschaffenden in Berlin as a ‘masterwork of socialist interior design’ without ‘relying on dead forms [but using] the media and methods of our time’ (‘dead forms’ was a reference to the socialist realist idea of appropriating national and regional traditions). Exner particularly praised the ‘interplay of colour, space, furnishing forms and the surface structures, which become the basis of the principle of a socialist, economical beauty of the club house’.32 For Exner, there was no separation in the status of designed goods and architecture, and the Bauhaus, in its understanding of serialized form as the way to produce economical, well-designed goods for the whole population and its interdisciplinary approach to solving design tasks, offered a basis for GDR design and architecture.33 In Schmidt’s view, Ehrlich sacrificed functionality for optical effects

28 Herbert Letsch, ‘Die konstruktivistische Ästhetik und das Problem der künstlerische Wiederspiegelung der Wirklichkeit’, Deutsche Zeitschrift der Philosophie, Berlin (9) 1961, 1102–18. 29 Reported by Hermann Exner in ‘Zweckmäßiger und billiger bauen: Gedanken zu den Aufgaben unserer Architekten im zweiten Fünfjahrplan’, Berliner Zeitung, 22 January 1957, 3. 30 Ibid. 31 ‘Konferenz über Grundlagen und Aufgaben einer sozialistischen Architekturtheorie’, DH2/21201, 1–3. 32 ‘Zusammenklang der Elemente’, ND , 10.05.1958, 9. 33 Hermann Exner, ‘Der Weg zu einer sozialistische Innensarchitektur. Eine Erwiderung auf die Artikel von Professor Hans Schmidt und Herbert Letsch’, DA 8/1959, 458.

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and the ‘aesthetic sensation of the department store’,34 in which ‘the spiritual emptiness which Capitalism has created in people is filled with an equally empty play with the random, illogical and spontaneous’.35 This kind of architecture was influenced by ‘the Bauhaus, Le Corbusier, Gropius and Mies van der Rohe, modern music, parallel with abstract painting, into which the architecture of the so-called free world falls in brilliant technique and in a subjective, lawless play with the aesthetic pull of colour, light, materials, and so on’.36 Art in socialist society had to be ‘more than playing around with artistic materials and techniques . . . architecture in particular cannot be content with this abstract, pretty play’.37 In response, Exner accused Schmidt of being out of touch with ordinary people: Ehrlich’s design required ‘no art historical knowledge . . . of national traditions’. Exner was arguing less for educating people up towards the morality and authenticity of socialist architecture as defined by experts, but proposing that experts might take account of what ordinary people enjoy. This was less an ideological category of ‘joy’ and ‘beauty’ in socialism, and much more a populist idea of pleasurable experience. It was exactly this kind of shift to experiential pleasure rather than an intellectually ideologically defined socialist aesthetic that eventually took place in the 1970s and 1980s. But in the mid-1960s there were higher ambitions for a distinctly socialist architecture and design. Herbert Letsch seized on the lack of ideological foundation in Exner’s argument: The point is that the worker should be raised to the highest levels of the material and ideal culture. This is the point of the whole politics of the socialist state. It is not enough to develop a ‘sense of space’ or a ‘sense of colour’ and so on. We have much higher aims than Hermann Exner! The socialist person is determined by . . . their high understanding of art.38

Departures towards a conception of design Realist-Modernist Ornament It became increasingly clear that the aesthetic qualities of the new architecture needed to be realized in practice. Ornament, evidently not so dispensable, was to return as a means to deliver ‘beauty’. Deutsche Architektur devoted the best

34 Schmidt, Hans, ‘Was wir von einer sozialistische Innenarchitektur erwarten. Einige kritische Bemerkungen zu dem Klubhaus für Kulturschaffende in Berlin’, DA 2/1959, p 100–10. 35 Ibid. 36 Ibid. 37 Ibid. 38 Hermann Exner, ‘Der Weg zu einer sozialistische Innensarchitektur.’ 1959.

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part of a double issue to the topic in June/July 1961. A new conception of ‘ornament’, ‘surface relief’, or ‘structural relief’, which used modularized industrially produced elements, experimenting with the application of surfacing materials such as enamel, ceramic, concrete and glass, alongside hand-crafted structures, gave architects and applied artists a new outlet for experimentation with form, similar to concurrent experiments with surface structures in modern architecture in the West, but which could be conceived of as on a continuum with the understanding of ornament as a carrier of socialist value.39 At the Hochschule für Architektur und Bauwesen or HAB (College for Architecture and Building) in Weimar, Siegfried Tschierschky, professor for ‘the artistic in architecture’, actively sought in his early 1960s teaching to research the visual form of a modernized realist architecture, in particular in the questions of surface relief and colour. Tschierschky framed his ideas as a development of socialist realism, in no way counter to it. Like Schmidt, he envisaged a classical architecture in terms of structure, order and harmony to be achieved using the means of industrial building.40 Ornament and ‘the artistic’, he claimed, was central to the completeness of the architecture.41 Unlike Schmidt, Tschierschky offered some interesting design solutions in practice where socialist connotated iconography such as the peace dove was semi-abstracted into a modular form, which could then be repeated to make a modern, perforated structure. For Schmidt this was not a satisfactory solution. He saw the semi-pictorial, architectural-structural elements as compromising both to architecture and to art. They were no longer art, as they were part of the building, neither were they architecture, since they had no structural function. For Schmidt the artworks had to be completely separate from the building.42 In this, Schmidt advocated a function for art which took a radical step away from ‘synthesis’. The ‘classical’ ideals which he advanced were entirely in relation to order and rationality and took leave of the idea that art would be actually integrated within the fabric of the building. In the same 1961 issue of Deutsche Architektur, Fritz Kühn, a highly esteemed metal designer, positioned his work as more akin to design, ‘additional, but not superfluous’ to function, which he rhetorically justified through the ubiquitous beauty concept as expressed by Goethe: ‘from the useful, through truth, to the beautiful’.43 The three theoretical positions on ornament which were presented can be summarized as: structural ornament is justified as modernized socialist

39

An illustration from the West German journal Baukunst und Werkform, 2/1960 of an ornamental facade with a sculpture is given without reference to location in Schmidt’s piece, ‘Architektonische Probleme der Struktur und der Ausbildung der Oberflächen im industriellen Bauen’, DA , 6/7 1961, 319. 40 Siegfried Tschierschky, ‘Über Ansätze zu einer echten Bindung von bildkünstlerischen Mitteln im industriellen Bauen’, DA 6/7 1961, 311. 41 Ibid. 42 Schmidt, ‘Architektonische Probleme der Struktur’, 1961. 43 Fritz Kühn, ‘Metall in der Architektur’, 1961, 359–61.

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realist ornament (Tschierschky); art should be independent of architecture (Schmidt); and ornament which does not contradict structure can make a contribution to beauty in modern architecture (Kühn). Tschierschky’s theoretical work and teaching opened the way for an apparently politically acceptable exploration of abstract form making for facades and independent structures by artists as well as architects. Leading practitioners from the 1960s on were Hubert Schiefelbein at Weimar, but equally Karl-Heinz Adler,44 Siegfried Schade and Elfriede Schade of the Dresden collective ‘PG Kunst am Bau’ (Figure 3.1). Given the rigid restrictions of architectural production

Figure 3.1 Karl-Heinz Adler and Friedrich Kracht, Serielles Betonformsteinsystem (Modular Concrete Form System), 1976 pictured here at the 8th National Art Exhibition of the GDR 10.01.1977–02.04.1978. Most of the pieces made using the system did not appear as free-standing works. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Reinecke. 44 For further discussion on Karl-Heinz Adler, see Hans Ulrich Obrist et al. (eds), Karl-Heinz Adler: Art in the System. The System in Art (Leipzig: Leipzig Spector Books, 2017). Adler enjoyed a public renaissance as an abstract artist after the end of the GDR.

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and the demand for realism and narrative within fine art, this pathfinding work of Tschierschky was undoubtedly welcomed as a space for experiment with form. The new, modular ornament was not the ornament of botanical flourishes but was formed from simple geometry, built in concrete – in fact, analogous to the exercises set by Josef Albers in his Bauhaus foundation course. Whether convincingly realist or not, Tschierschky’s research precipitated a new genre in architectural art and provided a chance for creative experiment for both artists and architects.

Realist-Modernist Colour In socialist realist thinking, colour for the sake of colour was no better than form for the sake of form (formalism) and therefore the development of colour theory required a rationale which eschewed a direct relationship between the ‘psychological’ benefits of colour in prefabricated building in favour of strictly materialist arguments anchored in socialist relations.45 Alongside researches on ornament, Tschierschky developed a ‘socialist realist method’ for the colouring of building ensembles.46 Here too he tried to justify a middle way between architecture as either a form of art or as a form of order/function. Both art and architecture were bildhaft (pictorial) but in painting there was an Abbild (representation), and in architecture an Ordnungsbild (order of the image) ‘in which the image character develops’. Tschierschky explained this difference essentially in terms of primary and secondary functions: in painting the order followed the image, and in architecture the image followed the order. (Thus, as with Schmidt’s arguments, it was ‘order’ that defined the artistic task.) The closest connections between the two were present in the application of colour. Through this argument, Tschierschky attempted to wrest the colouring of architecture from the domain of the aesthetic decisions of professional decorators – such as the readers of Farbe und Raum – and resituate it within the domain of art, which was essentially different in being ‘writable’,47 that is, it could be inscribed with meaning. For Tschierschky, getting the colour right in the new architectural ensembles was a matter of direct importance for the new residents: It is essential that the urban conception is made clear through colour, not least because the observer first has to get used to the proportions which are still

45 J. R. Jenkins, ‘A System of Joyful Colour and its Disruptions: Architectural Colour in the German Democratic Republic’, Architectural Theory Review, 19(2), 2014. 46 Siegfried Tschierschky, ‘Zur realistische Methode der Farbgebung’, 1961/1, 34–5. 47 Beschreibbar, meaning writable, open to description or inscription and hence the possibility to assign ideological meaning.

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unfamiliar, because only through that can he take part in the artistic experience of the new.48 Tenuously, Tschierschky also claimed to have developed a ‘realistic’ method of colouring through modelling and colouring techniques. The description of the method referred to the need to correctly simulate the final colour within the built environment in the architectural model, which in being ‘realistic’, he argued, could be situated as a method of socialist realism. In the early 1960s new housing developments of serialized architecture began to be developed with colour schemes. In response, Schmidt began to develop his theories on ‘socialist colour’. He was critical of developments which he believed to be insufficiently rationalized. Richard Paulick’s application of bright colours to the slab building surfaces in Living Complex One in Hoyerswerda amounted to ‘a tectonic which contradicts the facades’; Paulick in turn defended his colour scheme a reference to the traditional Sorbian architecture of the region, and thus in the spirit of socialist realism.49 In March 1963, Bruno Flierl published the developments in colour thinking in Deutsche Architektur. The issue included Hans Schmidt’s ‘Colour in Architecture and Urbanism’ as well as Flierl’s own favourable report on colour in system-built architecture in Romania. In his piece, Schmidt couched the correct understanding of colour in terms of art but was keen to disassociate the flat geometric architectural colour of slab architecture from abstract art, since in Schmidt’s conception colour was not autonomous. Nonetheless, Schmidt claimed, abstract artists such as Mondrian had expressed the new beauty of colour.50 According to Schmidt, each societal epoch had a colour in architecture which corresponded to the power relations, and so the new socialist era also demanded such an expression based on a Gesetzmässigkeit (set of laws or principles). Colour was not a means to relieve monotony but had an important meta-function, that of creating order. Whilst colour reflected a joy of life, this was within a clearly ordered and disciplined system which had been determined in line with artistic principles, corresponding to the model of the joyful but disciplined GDR citizen. Schmidt warned several times against the inappropriateness of Buntheit, that is, overly bright and vivid colours, as they could suggest artificiality. Most importantly, for Schmidt, colours had to be conceived of in terms of schemes for entire urban ensembles, for entire living

48

Ibid. ‘Konferenz über Grundlagen und Aufgaben einer sozialistischen Architekturtheorie’, DH2/21201, 1–3. 50 Hans Schmidt, ‘Farbe in Architektur und Städtebau’, DA , 3 (1961), 157–61, 157. 49

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complexes with their schools, kindergartens, sports, cultural and other public buildings. Schmidt and his colleagues grew increasingly confident of their reconception of socialist architecture, but discomfort was fomenting on the critical editorial line that Flierl was developing in Deutsche Architektur. The colour issue of March 1963 had severe repercussions at the seventh Plenum of the Building Academy, at which virtually all the leading architects – Bruno Flierl, Kurt Junghanns, Hermann Henselmann, Richard Paulick, Martin Wimmer and many others – were made to undergo ideological correction via self-criticism. Gerhard Kosel, who replaced Kurt Liebknecht as president of the Bauakademie, accused these architects of losing sight of their brief and becoming concerned with their own professional vanity rather than the opinions of ordinary people. Kosel pointed to a case in Dresden of an exhibition on colour for planned residential complexes, in which it was written in the caption that the colour was ‘only to be used by experts, and not for half educated amateurs who are not capable of judging colour compositions’:51 How wrong this attitude is, and how productive is the work of those who are politically experienced, who are closely connected with the struggle of the working class, and closely connected with the lives of our population in solving the problems of urbanism and architecture.52 The implication of this statement is clearly that the modernizers were out of touch with popular taste, whilst those in political rather than expert positions were closer to understanding the working people. Whilst the colour question was only one of a whole range of criticisms addressed to architects at the seventh Plenum in June 1963, it is notable that when Schmidt developed his colour theory in October 1963 in a more extended paper for the ninth Plenary session of the Bauakademie, he dropped references to positive aspects of abstract art and referred to folk art (a central trope of socialist realism) as typifying the popular appreciation of colour.53 Schmidt also took the opportunity to clarify ‘incorrect’ views of beauty. Beauty was ‘societally specific’, and it was the task in socialism to create the theory and practice for architecture, in order to understand beauty: ‘It is clear that socialist architecture cannot . . . just build on the general human perception of beauty in its most

51 Gerhard Kosel, 7. Plenartagung, Closed Meeting: ‘Ideological Questions of Urbanism andArchitecture’, Berlin, 12 July 1963. Insert into DA , Deutsche Bauakademie, Berlin, 1963, 23, 9. 52 Ibid. 53 Hans Schmidt, ‘Die Farbe als Mittel des künstlerischen Ausdrucks’, 1963.

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developed form. It also has to expect to embody the historically concrete, “modern” perception of beauty of the socialist society.’54 Thus, beauty was, like the built environment, to be societally constructed, to be formed alongside the conception for socialist architecture. In spite of his many absolute definitions of a socialist architecture, and of correct and incorrect form, Schmidt was exceptional in proposing beauty as a social construct, rather than using it simply as a slippery concept that could justify one position or another.

Architectural art reconfigured as a function of design Schmidt’s anti-aestheticizing, functionalist and moralistic order of socialist beauty stripped the socialist realist architecture of any narrative manifestations either through works of art or ornament. His negative definitions of what socialist beauty was not – that is, Western-imitating, modish, inspired by abstract art, a kind of ‘nierentisch aesthetic’ which had caught the popular imagination in West Germany;55 in sum, creating a false aesthetic consciousness – did not offer a specifically socialist aesthetic, but a socialist moral order which had an aesthetic manifestation. The relationship of this aesthetic order or ‘beauty’ to socialist society was a correspondence between order, discipline, clarity and ‘joy’, in the sense of the collective joy of the life that necessarily resulted from socialist relations. Importantly, this visual order was a presented as a complete design for the urban environment, in which a solution would be arrived at through careful planning and coordination of the social, technical, economic, environmental and artistic functions. The fact that this modular production was machine-made rather than handbuilt by craftspeople was viewed by Schmidt and his colleagues only as a technological development. The theory conferences of 1959/60 served to push architecture away from the domain of ‘art’, but resistance to this secured the place of art within the functionalism-inclined discourse. Whilst Schmidt claimed that the aesthetic order or the beauty of the built environment was a manifestation of socialism, the absence of a clearly readable and material socialist narrative remained critical. The essential point to emerge from these struggles was that the work of art within the urban ensemble, as the potential carrier of clear ideological content, was to become an inviolable part of urban planning.

54

Hans Schmidt, ‘Was ist Schönheit in die Architektur: über die Notwendigkeit der Architekturkritik und der Architekturtheorie’, DA 10/1963, 584. 55 Paul Betts, ‘The Nierentisch Nemesis: Organic Design as West German Pop Culture’, German History, 19, 2001, 185–217.

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The restraining influence of the events of 1962 and 1963 was evident in the way Schmidt and his colleagues adjusted their approach at the ninth Plenum of the Bauakademie in 1963. The author collective of Die Aufgaben von Städtebau und Architektur led by Hans Schmidt then clearly announced that the ‘socialist realist method’ for ‘artistic questions’ in architecture should be the criteria of Party-mindedness, connectedness to the people and technical mastery.56 Partymindedness should be evident in meeting the socialist society and people’s expectations of beauty, which should lead to a socialist style of building. Connectedness to the people determined socialist art – so here again architecture was framed in terms of art, and finally the technical mastery would be evident in the functional, technical and economic realization, ‘just as in the mastery of the laws of beauty’.57 The research was highly critical of actual developments in technical construction, serialization and complex urbanism, which had failed to optimize spatial and structural arrangements for the unfolding of socialist life, and claimed that in the period since the first theory conference there had been a standstill in theory.58 Having wrested architecture from the domain of art, Schmidt’s report now claimed that ‘the artistic’ had been neglected.59 Criticism ‘from the population but also particularly from the Party’ in relation to ‘monotony, unsatisfactory serial types and colour’ were common, but Schmidt insisted that ‘architecture is defined through its social and societal content’ which will determine ‘not just technical questions but artistic ones, and that these bring new aesthetic approaches’. Specifically, artworks – even mosaics and frescos – should be separated from the building and set within the urban composition as whole; bold, large-scale solutions, respective of the scale and life in the new urbanism, should be tried, thus realizing the Leninist idea of monumental propaganda. The statement managed to address all the competing questions around beauty, function, the socialist nature of architecture, the role of art and the problem of monotony in serialized building through a careful balancing act between societal and aesthetic definitions. Architecture was reasserted as a genre of art, ‘or design, to use the more common expression’ (my italics) in its societal functions which demonstrated ‘the character of societal life, and the condition of the material and ideal society’. Underlying these complex descriptions was an emergent concept of design, the socially and technologically optimized spatial and aesthetic ordering for

56 ‘Die Aufgaben von Städtebau und Architektur beim Umfassenden Aufbau des Sozialismus: Arbeitsmaterial Zum Hauptreferat für Die 9. Plenartagung Der Deutschen Bauakademie’ (Berlin: Deutsche Bauakademie, 1963). 57 Ibid, 65–6. 58 These criticisms are made throughout the report. 59 Schmidt, ‘Die Aufgaben von Städtebau und Architektur’, 1963.

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human needs. The rejection of building as a form of art (Baukunst) made way for a nascent Complex Environmental Design. Although Bruno Flierl rejected the idea of synthesis, he acknowledged the political importance and significance of art within public space and within architecture to a much greater extent than Schmidt, who limited the significance of works of art as potentially complementary to architectural space. Flierl posited art as an essential subsystem within the built environment, and in the years following the height of Schmidt’s influence in the early and mid-1960s, Flierl devoted his research to the concept of Complex Environmental Design, which retained an ideological role for art in the built environment.60 The development of a socially oriented environmental design was eased by the gradual integration of the social sciences as a university discipline. Described in retrospect as a ‘hidden discourse of reform’, a number of key thinkers including Fred Staufenbiel, Hermann Henselmann, Bernd Hunger and later Bernd Grönwald, Christian Schädlich and Rolf Kuhn advanced socially oriented ideas of culture and socialist way of life as the basis for planning architecture.61 Rather than the disembodied ‘beauty of life’ and the moralizing tone of Schmidt, Staufenbiel argued in 1966 for an understanding of architecture based on its use value, ‘the spatial environmental design of the way of life’. The function of architecture was to create a ‘milieu’ and thus a social-cultural value. The reining-in of the architects in 1963 was undoubtedly related to geopolitical tension over the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962, which brought the superpowers close to war. Industrial design equally saw a revival of anti-formalism attacks in the press following a distinctly pro-Modernist curation of works by Horst Michel at the 1962/3 art exhibition.62 These episodes underline the supreme importance attached to the orthodoxy of realism as an indication of the success of the socialist state, where something as apparently harmless as an undecorated vase could be interpreted as a challenge to the stability of socialism. The ‘ideological reinforcement’ of artists, designers and architects in the period 1962 to 1963 represented a braking mechanism on cultural change being driven by professionals rather than determined by central policy, at a time when major economic and structural changes were being introduced. The period was

60

Lange, ‘Komplexe Umweltgestaltung’, 2016. Christoph Bernhardt, Thomas Flierl and Max Welch-Guerra (eds), Städtebau-Debatten in der DDR: Verborgene Reformdiskurse (Berlin: Theater der Zeit, 2012). The 1976 Bauhaus conference set up by Bernd Grönwald together with Christian Schädlich was to become a platform for networking and reformist discourse both within the GDR and internationally. Max Welch Guerra, ‘Räumliche Planung und Reformpolitik’, 6–12 (introduction). 62 Fifth General German Art Exhibition, Dresden, 22 September 1962–6 March 1963. 61

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overshadowed by a number of Cold War tensions63 and jostling for power within the ZK of the SED.64 At the sixth SED Congress in January 1963, Ulbricht introduced the N Ö SPL (Principles for the New Economic System of Planning and Management of the National Economy). Ulbricht set as the fundamental cultural task, ‘the spiritual forming of people within the socialist society and the development of a socialist national culture’.65 Industrial and cultural production were understood as advancing symbiotically.66 In the simultaneous planning of the new, reconstructed city centres, alongside the first fully architecturally modern industrial town for chemistry workers, Halle-Neustadt, Ulbricht drove forward the key political ambitions: economic and industrial modernization twinned with the embedding and reproduction of socialist culture. This expansion was economically and industrially but also extremely symbolically significant (and was to represent Ulbricht’s legacy) in representing the unequivocal embrace of material and architectural modernity.

Conclusion The 1960s saw an ongoing battle of ideas between modernizing architects who wanted to make a cautious reappropriation of some of the early-twentiethcentury ideas on planning, design and art, and those who saw any demotion of the art content as a denial of ideological – that is, socialist – content. For some, realist ideas of ‘synthesis’ and an attachment to the visual signifiers of socialism were viewed as a bulwark against the apparent emptiness of Modernist ‘styling’. The resistance of realists to what they saw as a creeping functionalism meant that architecture was never entirely wrested from its characterization as an art form manifesting socialist ideals. Art was easily conflated with aesthetics and appearance, and thus if architecture no longer took the appearance of what was understood as socialist realism, then for some, socialism itself was undermined. Over the course of the 1960s an uneasy consensus was reached which retained aspects of the socialist realist tradition. The new town centres on which Ulbricht staked his reputation were articulated as socialist narratives in which the themes of works of art and their strategic positioning played a key role. As such they

63 These years following the building of the Berlin Wall in August 1961 also saw the negotiations over the new Emergency Law in Bonn (1962), the murder of US President John F. Kennedy (1963) and the Kafka Conference in Liblice, Czecholoslovakia (1963). 64 Monika Kaiser, ‘Reforming Socialism? The Changing of the Guard from Ulbricht to Honecker during the 1960s’, in Konrad Hugo Jarausch et al. (eds), Dictatorship as Experience: Towards a Sociocultural History of the GDR (Oxford, New York: Berghahn Books, 1999), 331. 65 Karl Max Kober, Zum Kunstprozess Der Sechziger Jahre (Leipzig: Karl-Marx-Universität, 1984). 66 Joachim Detjen, Politische Bildung: Geschichte und Gegenwart in Deutschland (Oldenburg: Wissenschafts Verlag, 2007), 202–5.

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modernized the socialist realist conception of the parade avenue and square towards more leisurely experiences, but still these were choreographed through strategically positioned works of art. Through a composite of serialized design and unique works of fine and applied arts, a planned and harmonious unity was intended to both reflect and form the ‘socialist way of life’.

Chapter 4 New Socialist Landscapes and the Building of Halle-Neustadt

The building of Halle-Neustadt beginning in 1964 was the first major test of the comprehensive application of prefabricated building methods. The new town was built in the pioneer spirit of comparable Modernist projects internationally and was accompanied from the outset by myth making about the social promise of the planned city. This secured the political project in East Germany in the aftermath of fascism as it reoriented towards a technological age, where science and technology were to deliver new standards of living and economic competitiveness. A similar ‘reboot’ to the socialist imaginary took place in the Soviet Union as it harnessed the Space Race as a means of engendering optimism.1 The shift in perspective was reflected in new themes for public art works. The farmer enjoying the benefits of collectivization or learning to read was displaced by the chemist, the educated worker and the cosmonaut. The technological era also brought about experiments in form making and innovations in materials and methods which created new possibilities in public art. In spite of the warnings about the dangers of convergence with the West from senior Party members in the function-oriented fields of architecture and design, there was also optimism and ambition amongst architects who embraced industrialized building and the attendant possibilities of large-scale tabula rasa planning. At the same time, it did not go unnoticed by artists that whilst in architecture and design the demands of economic production allowed for a modernization, the fine arts – in particular painting – were held to the 1950s interpretation of realism. In January 1963, writers and artists including Willi Sitte and Willi Neubert in the Bezirk Halle were subject to rigorous admonishment by local SED leaders Koenen, Frost, Machacek and Bruk, who claimed that the artists were ‘endangering socialism’ against the backdrop of international tension

1

Eva Maurer, Julia Richers, Monica Rüthers and Carmen Scheide, ‘What Does “Space Culture” Mean in Soviet Society?’ in Cosmic Enthusiasm: The Cultural Impact of Soviet Space Exploration since the 1950s (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), 3–6.

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and the Cuban Missile Crisis. The realities of ‘imperialism’ and the international political tensions, and (hence) the need to make art that had a resonance with ordinary people, were repeatedly invoked.2 In their defence, the artists emphasized their Party loyalty but claimed that art had to be able to develop. Neubert stated that ‘art cannot only be only for educating, without it being possible to educate art itself’.41 Sitte insisted he had ‘never called for some kind of freedom or tolerance’42 and that his works were not ‘decadent and unrealistic [but] more realistic than some other pictures’. A revised approach to the period of the ‘classical modern’ and revolutionary socialist art was partly facilitated by art critics and university research groups over the course of the late 1950s and early 1960s. They rehabilitated the German proletarian revolutionary art of the 1920s, conceptualizing it as a foundation for socialist realism (thus the contradiction of a critical art becoming an affirmative art was overlooked).3 Expressionist painting as an artistic means was also gradually reappraised. But this did not translate into liberalization for practitioners. Throughout 1962, there was an ongoing debate within newspapers and journals on the principles of realism, with artists criticized for tendencies drawn from ‘world art’ and lack of Verbundenheit (connectedness) with the people.4 These years of interventions against the efforts of some artists to shift the boundaries of socialist realism culminated in the explosive fifth Artists’ Union (VBKD) congress in 1964. Artists Hermann Raum, Fritz Cremer and Bernhard Heisig vehemently attacked the conservative, academic demands of socialist realist painting. They were in turn strongly opposed by the art critic Klaus Weidner, art historian Ullrich Kuhirt and artist Walter Womacka. Neubert and Sitte did not make public comments on this occasion.5 Cremer’s speech picked apart every aspect of the socialist realist model. He called for ‘a kind of 20th or 21st party congress in the area of culture’ and the jettisoning of all terms such as abstraction, formalism, decadence, mastery, beauty, volkstümlich, volksverbunden (‘we know what happened with this blood and earth talk’), or the idea of an optimistic art in order to redefine realism.6

2

Unfortunately, the list of all the artists and writers present was given in a separate document, missing in the archive. ‘Stenographisches Protokoll der Aussprache der Genossen des Sekretäriats der BL mit Künstlern der Berzike Halle’, 9 January 1963, LHASA, Merseburg, IV/A-2/3/1 BL der SED Protokolle 1963. 3 Goeschen, Vom Sozialistischen Realismus, 2001, 77–92. 4 Karl Max Kober, ‘Zum Kunstprozess Der Sechziger Jahre’, (Leipzig: Karl-Marx-Universität, 1984), 12. 5 Parteiaktivtagung on 10.06.1964, Arch AdK. VBK Zentralvorstand – 70. 6 The speech was reprinted in the West German newspaper FAZ , though not, unsurprisingly, in the GDR. ‘Diskussionsbeitrag von Fritz Cremer auf dem V. Kongress des Verbandes Bildender Künstler’, BArch, DF 7/3078, Bandnummer: 2.

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The painter Bernhard Heisig, at the time head of the Halle art and design school, Burg Giebichenstein, noted the unequal development of the designbased disciplines including architecture and fine art. In the former, ‘a type of class-indifferent character is granted’. Architecture in the GDR ‘soon will not be distinguishable from the architecture of the West’. On this basis, Heisig argued, art, in particular architectural art, should also be liberalized.7 The type of realism which had been inherited from the Soviet Union seemed inappropriate for the new flat, bold shapes of buildings.8 Although Heisig was made to publicly withdraw his comments, in practice he illustrated his intention by producing a series of flat, graphic, compositionally complex interior murals as part of a series inside the Hotel Deutschland in Leipzig. The murals sparked a controversy due to their highly modernistic, stylized appearance. Alfred Kurella, guardian of socialist realism, claimed that architectural art was being used as a back door for ‘formalist, anti-realist, abstract . . . “art” ’.9 Besides the difficulty of imagining what kind of art would be appropriate in these new built environments within the socialist realist prescription, there was also an imbalance of influence between architects and artists. Heisig described the ‘aversion of architects to murals’ and suggested that artists were treated by architects as colourists.10 In the arts fora, discussions revolved around the practical difficulties faced by the freelance artist – brought in after the architectural planning stage, unfamiliar with architects’ collective working methods, and lacking resources and facilities on the necessary scale for monumental work. Industrialized building seemed to point to new kinds of art which could also benefit from developing technologies. In a rare piece of architectural comedy, Hermann Henselmann parodied the relationship between artists and architects – architects personified as a smart, modern young woman, and artists as a romantic underdog of a young man.11 These conflicts seemed to be structurally inherent in the unfolding system of constructing the socialist built environment, which was advancing with increasing tempo. By 1965 it was clear that the synthesis question needed to be addressed directly by artists and architects together.

7

‘Von der Parteiaktivtagung zu Fragen der BK in der Möwe’, transcript of recording, 10.06.64, 2, in AdK, Berlin, VBK Zentralvorstand – 70. The text and all the content of this argument is taken from Heisig’s retraction as the orginal speech is not reproduced. 8 Bernhard Heisig, ‘Von der Parteiaktivtagung’, 1964, 2. Heisig lost this post after the Congress, although not as a direct consequence of his interventions at the conference. April Eisman, ‘In the Crucible: Bernhard Heisig and the Hotel Deutschland Murals’, in Amy Wlodarski and Elaine Kelly (eds), Art Outside the Lines: New Perspectives on GDR Art Culture (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2011), 21–39. See also April Eisman, Bernhard Heisig and the Fight for Modern Art in East Germany, 2018, 81–104. 9 Eisman, ‘In the Crucible’, 25. 10 Heisig, ‘Von der Parteiaktivtagung’, 1964. 11 Hermann Henselmann, ‘Strassenbekanntschaft: Oder Kennt Ihr Euch Überhaupt?’ DA 5, 1962, 260.

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Seminar on the on the synthesis of art and architecture in 1965 In 1965 the VBKD held a high-level seminar to consider the forms of art that could be integrated into the new architecture.12 The contributions mainly exposed an understanding of the problems but at the same time the lack of agency of artists who were called upon to respond to the needs of industrialized building. Artists and critics, including Walter Womacka, Wolfgang Frankenstein and Klaus Weidner, called for a less technocratic approach to building, better architecture which lent itself to art, and primarily the chance for artists to be fully integrated in the urban planning process – something that was planned to be regulated in a new law. New interpretations of synthesis were advanced and as with the concepts of realism and beauty, the accepted terms remained in place but were used flexibly. This is clear in the contribution of Ludwig Engelhardt, who advanced an essentially Modernist understanding of ‘synthesis’ similar to the proposals of Schmidt and Flierl, suggesting that art and architecture were independent entities but that they created new meaning in their union. Several speakers tried to imagine the possibilities that the new architecture presented artists, and to project the same kind of excitement that surrounded architectural reconstruction of the city centres by invoking twentieth-century precedents for public art which could be considered socialist, if not socialist realist. ‘Creative solutions’ were demanded: ‘We are building the world of tomorrow, and we . . . must think very broadly, and thoroughly creatively. It is not just a question of ticking off a point on the agenda.’13 Bruno Flierl called for an imaginative response to ‘the greatest task that has ever been set us’. Wolfgang Frankenstein, who had been a member of Modernist circles such as der ruf and Galerie Rosen, invoked once more the examples of Mexican muralismo and American socialist murals of the 1930s.14 Whilst claiming that socialist realism as an ideologically committed art was particularly appropriate to modern architecture that served a societal function, he argued that the formal explorations of abstract artists, despite not qualifying as ‘art’ within socialist realism, could be appropriated for the needs of socialist realism. Thus, since the architecture was in its function guaranteed to be socialist, new formal explorations could be accepted within the remit of socialist realism. The seminar was novel in that artists were able to propose a reinterpretation of realism in the case of architectural art to an audience of ministers, architects and planners from the highest levels. But whilst there was a debate, very few of 12 ‘Beiträge zur Diskussion über die Synthese von Architektur und bildender Kunst: 18.–19. November 1965’, DDR Collections Box 169, Folder 2, GRI, LA. 13 Helmut Heinze from Dresden, ibid. 14 Frankenstein was artistic director at the Galerie Gerd Rosen in Berlin (mentioned in Chapter 1) but moved to the GDR in 1953 in protest at re-militarization in the FRG. Together with Waldemar Grzimek and Gerhard Moll he worked on the ‘complex design’ of the Culture House in the Youth Workshop in Berlin-Hessenwinkel from 1951 to 1953.

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the artists’ contributions reached the wider audience of Deutsche Architektur or Bildende Kunst. There had been too much implied criticism of the building industry as a technocratic apparatus. The powerful figures at the conference were certainly not the artists: Edmund Collein, vice president of the Bauakademie urged artists to find ‘uncomplicated, creative solutions’. But change did occur by stealth. Whilst Cremer and his colleagues had been made to recant following the fifth congress of the Artists’ Union (VBKD) in 1964, the congress resolutions did offer an opening, declaring the ‘new type of person in socialism’, born of the technological revolution, ‘with new relationships to society and to the environment’.15 Although art was still to be readable, the people were now smarter. Soon afterwards at the second Bitterfeld Conference, Walter Ulbricht advanced a new interpretation of realism, not as a copy of reality, but something that could help form people. In other words, art was to be given a chance to form reality, not just reflect it. Realism should be understood as ‘the breadth and variety of our life’.16 Thus, the famous declaration of ‘breadth and variety’ as the basis of cultural policy set out by Erich Honecker at the VIII Party Congress in 1971 was set in motion six years earlier through the interventions of Cremer and others. As in the case of the artists’ collective in Hoyerswerda, the theoretical advances of Schmidt, Flierl and their circle, the dynamic of change was driven by practitioners rather than policymakers. In Halle-Neustadt we can see how ‘socialist landscapes’ emerged in the GDR, which made a transition from the principle of the ‘synthesis’ of art and architecture to Complex Environmental Design. Within these modern built environments, art found new functions, expression and materials.

Halle-Neustadt: ‘A chance to change the world’ The construction of the ‘chemistry workers’ town’, Halle-Neustadt,17 began in 1964 and was the first to be built using entirely prefabricated elements (Figure 4.1). The first four (of eventually ten) living complexes were to house seventy thousand residents within a decade. The living complex was ‘a spatially designed functional urban unit in which a large part of life processes of its residents take

15 ‘Die Bildende Kunst beim umfassenden Aufbau des Sozialismus in der DDR und die Aufgaben des Verbandes, Resolutions of the V. Kongress of the VBKD’, BK 6/64, 283–6, 284. 16 Walter Ulbricht, ‘Prinzipienfestigkeit ist nicht Dogmatismus’, 1964, 339–40. 17 Halle-Neustadt was planned to serve the VEB chemistry works in Buna Schkopau, the VEB Walter Ulbricht at Leuna, the VEB Mineralölwerk at Lützkendorf, the electrochemical Kombinat at Bitterfeld, VEB Gölzaplast and others. Joachim Bach, ‘Notate zur Planungsgeschichte Halle-Neustadts’, in Stadterneuerung als Prozess demokratischer und kultureller Weiterentwicklung: Perspektiven für HalleNeustadt (Projektgesellschaft mbH Dessau, Magistrat der Stadt Halle, 1993) 14–40.

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Figure 4.1 Halle-Neustadt, model, 1969. Photograph Berlin © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Manfred Thonig. Neubert’s Lebensbaum is partially visible in the background.

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place and in which it is possible to satisfy many material and intellectual needs of people’.18 Richard Paulick was charged with giving shape to this model city which should optimize the relationships between housing, work, children, education, food provision, recreation and transportation.19 The emphasis was therefore not on the town as a representational showpiece of socialism based on classical urban plans, as Eisenhüttenstadt had been a decade earlier, but on the optimization of its economic and social functions. This shift, which favoured the work of the planners and architects over that of the artists, was reflected in the initial art and design planning as well as the modernizing mythmaking which accompanied the project from the outset. For Paulick and his colleagues, the significance of the town lay in the drive to modernity necessary for the advance of socialism. This meant more than the modernization of industry and housing – it meant the modernization of people. Paulick claimed Halle-Neustadt would ‘get people out of their villages, out of isolation, get educated and participating in political life’.20 Whilst Halle-Neustadt in its conception offered the most complete vision for the unfolding of healthy, industrious and beautiful socialist life, as a model of egalitarian urban planning it was in line with the progressive twentieth-century tradition for the social possibilities of the planned city – Halle-Neustadt was built shortly after Brasilia (1958–60), for example. But it was understood as at frontier of what socialism through its economic base and cultural superstructure could achieve in urbanism and culture: technologically advanced, worker-oriented, children-oriented, publicly owned and collectively experienced. This promise was embedded in rituals, films, journalism, paintings and literature produced in the GDR. The massive construction site attracted hundreds of international visitors who wanted to witness, in the words of one Canadian journalist, ‘the civilisation of a new world’.21 Sigbert Fliegel, one of Halle-Neustadt’s architects and author of the artistic plan for the fourth residential complex, described the spirit of the time: People felt called to work on building Halle-Neustadt. We had foreigners who came especially to Germany, for example, from Columbia, from Bulgaria, from Poland, from Cambodia and Czechoslovakia, who came to us via

18 Halle-Neustadt, Karlheinz Schlesier et al., Halle-Neustadt: Plan und Bau der Chemiearbeiterstadt (Berlin: Verlag für Bauwesen, 1972), 85. 19 Paulick had not actually been able to study architecture at the Bauhaus since the subject was not offered at the time, but he worked in Walter Gropius’s architectural office and belonged to the Bauhaus circle. Paulick was appointed on 15 November 1963, and by December the competition for urban plans was launched. He held the post of chief architect until 1968 when Karlheinz Schlesier took on the role. 20 From the Directive for the urban design and the construction of Halle West, DA 9/1964. 21 Koplowitz, die taktstrasse, Nr 10, 20.03.1967.

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word of mouth. They were people who wanted to change the world. And Halle-Neustadt was a chance to do that.22 Joachim Bach, deputy chief architect, has also claimed that ‘optimism ruled’ and that Halle-Neustadt’s planners and architects shared a ‘pioneer spirit’.23 For the planners and architects, the development represented an uncompromised realization of all precedents for a modern, planned city. One of Halle-Neustadt’s architects, Karlheinz Schlesier, suggested in 2006 that Halle-Neustadt realized many of the aims of Le Corbusier’s 1933 Charter of Athens, ‘if in GDR colours’.24 The ninety-fifth point of the charter, which claimed to be ‘apolitical’, was that ‘private interests should be subordinated to the interests of the community’; this point was the very foundation of the new socialist town of Halle-Neustadt.25 Unlike the 1920s Neues Bauen movement, or the post-1934 CIAM, dominated by ‘apolitical’ voices,26 it was not compromised by social democracy, which left capitalist relations of production intact. Neither was it compromised by conflicting architectural and urban approaches, which had curtailed the ambitions of functionalist planners in the Soviet Union in the early 1930s. Halle-Neustadt was constructed in an era of political stability and expanding industrial output in the GDR, and thus free of the unrest that had tarnished the image of workers’ unity in the building of Stalinallee in 1953. Specifically, it set out to ‘learn from the mistakes of Hoyerswerda’,27 seen as a false start in the GDR’s adventure with industrialized building. Halle-Neustadt was, in the cybernetic modishness of the day, to be almost a self-regulating28 entity of urban production and reproduction29 – in the words of the new local SED leader, Horst Sindermann, ‘a

22

Sigbert Fliegel, interview with the author, 2012. Bach, ‘Notate. . .’, 20–2. 24 Karlheinz Schlesier, ‘Zwischen Freundschaft und Kollegialität’, in Peter Müller and Wolfgang Thöner (eds), Bauhaus-Tradition und DDR-Moderne: der Architekt Richard Paulick (Munich: Deutscher Kunstverlag, 2006). The functional city proposed within the 1933 Charter of Athens did not suggest a causal relationship between the population and economic production – which was the case in HalleNeustadt, like Eisenhüttenstadt, Hoyerswerda and Schwedt – but rather a dynamic one: ‘Neither latent wealth requiring exploitation nor individual energy has any absolute character. All is in movement and, in the long run, economics is never anything but a monetary value’ (‘Generalities, Observations, The City and its Regions’, Section 4, Le Corbusier, The Athens Charter, translated from the French by Anthony Eardly (Grossmann, New York, 1973)). 25 The Athens Charter, Article 95: ‘In every instance, private interests must be subordinated to the collective interest, so that each individual will have access to the fundamental joys, the well-being of the home, and the beauty of the city.’ Ibid. 26 Eric Mumford, ‘CIAM and the Communist Bloc, 1928–59’, Journal of Architecture, 14(2): 237 (2009), 237–54. 27 Thomas Topfstedt, Städtebau in der DDR, 1955–1971 (Leipzig: Seemann, 1988), 36. 28 Joachim Bach, ‘Der Generalbebauungsplan der Chemiearbeiterstadt Halle-West. Ein Blick in die Zukunft’, in die taktstraße, 28/29.11.1966, 6–7. 29 Pasternak also makes this observation. Peer Pasternak, Zwischen Halle-Novgorod und Halle-New Town. Der Ideenhaushalt Halle-Neustadts (Halle: Der Hallesche Graureihe 2, 2012), 53. 23

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city in which to live there means happiness for everyone, in which the past would disappear’.30 The echo of the optimism of interwar avant-gardists in the vision of Halle-Neustadt in the mid-1960s was born of the promise of industrial progress, but, more importantly in the GDR, of the intellectual shift which accompanied it. The subtext of this vision of the promise of the planned city in its post-war incarnation was that of the design discourse – the way in which the optimized planning and technology would improve lives. In the initial planning, art – still the essential component to maintain socialist content – was almost forgotten.

Artistic developments in Halle Neustadt and beyond (1964–71) Halle-Neustadt31 was the first big test for architectural art at the time when reformist artists were struggling to expand socialist realism. So, it seems surprising that the 1963 urban design competition for Halle-Neustadt made no mention of works of art. In fact, the only reference to the appearance of the town in the competition evaluation was the importance of avoiding visual monotony. In order to counter this ever-present anxiety around the potential for soulless built environments, referred to by Paulick as a ‘childhood illness’, the conception for the visual design of Halle-Neustadt in Paulick’s 1964 report made it clear that artistic media would just be one element alongside other design elements such as colour, seating and lighting. For all the careful theorizing about the significance of art in the new socialist landscapes, in the actual planning artists were secondary, enjoying none of the sense of ‘creating a new world’ experienced by Halle-Neustadt’s collective of architects. There was nonetheless an attempt to overcome organizational difficulties such as the absence of cooperation between artists, architects, planners and engineers in the form of a Beirat für bildende Kunst und Baukunst (Council for Art and Building Art) in Halle-Neustadt. The plan was that artworks should not be added on later in an ad hoc fashion without an overall artistic concept, as had occurred in Eisenhüttenstadt, Hoyerswerda and Schwedt.32 The remit of the council was to ensure the organizational and political realization of the works, and to ensure that each commissioned artist would realize the work ‘in a high quality, on the basis of his specialist and ideological

30

Schlesier, ‘Plan und Bau der Chemiearbeiterstadt’, 1972, 11. Until 1967 ‘Halle West’. 32 Bruno Flierl, ‘Bildkünstlerische Konzeption für grosse städtebauliche Ensembles’, BK 10/66, 507–12. 31

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competence’.33 In this sense, the works of art were to be planned much as the urban plan, but the council was effectively a body for administration and ideological monitoring. The themes for each of the four living complexes were conceived not by the chief architect, or artists and designers, but by the Department of Agitation and Propaganda and followed the political priorities of the day: ‘Friendship of peoples’, ‘The role of the chemistry industry for technological and scientific progress’, ‘Science, art and literature’ and the familiar ‘Workers’ movement, struggle against oppression and exploitation’ (Figure 4.2).34 Artists were commissioned to create works within these themes, but the actual execution of the works, at least in the first living complex, took place in isolation from the architectural planning, with the inevitable result that the works, positioned within or on buildings, did have an ad hoc relationship to the surroundings and the scale of the buildings.

Halle Neustadt 1964/65 Ideological subject themes for the first four Living Complexes

LK3 Education Centre

Halle Town

Renau planned panorama (1970)

c Centre: Construction of Socialism

LK4

LK1

b

Centre

a

LK 2

a. Karl-Marx Allee b. Friedrich Engels Promenade c. Leninplatz LK1 LK2 LK3 LK4

Friendship of the peoples The role of the chemistry industry for technological and scientific progress The struggle against imperialism The struggle for maintaining peace S Bahn station

Figure 4.2 Thematic plan for works of art in the first four Living Complexes of HalleNeustadt. Drawing © J. R. Jenkins.

33 Bruno Hellmuth, in ‘Beirat für bildende und Baukunst: Möglichkeiten zur Verbesserung der Zusammenarbeit zwischen Architekten, Projektanten und bildendern Künstlern beim Aufbau der Chemie-Arbeiterstadt Halle West’, BK 1966, 98. 34 Political ideological conception for the design of the Chemistry Workers Town, Halle-West, Halle 18.9.1965, headed by Franz Bruk, Department of Agitation and Propaganda. LHASA, MER, M 516, IV/A–2/3/83, 6.

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The following account of the works which were commissioned and placed within the living complexes and central areas of Halle-Neustadt deals with the period from the initial plan up to 1973. (In subsequent years until 1989 there were many more works produced which reflected the developing forms and ideals for public art. By 1989 there were approximately 150 works of art and design in Halle-Neustadt, just under half of those in exterior spaces.)35 In the course of the planning, the themes set out by the Department for Agitation and Propaganda would become less manifest. ‘Friendship of peoples’ in Living Complex One was only suggested in three works: Die Afrikanerin (The African Woman), a realist bronze by Gerhard Geyer; Die Erde hat Genug Brot für Alle (The Earth has Enough Bread for Everyone), a ceramic tile mural of people in folk costumes by Irmela and Martin Hadelich (Plate 19) situated in a passageway; and Völkerfreundschaft (Friendship of the People) by Heinz Bebernis. Other works in Living Complex One were Die Schwimmerin (The Swimmer), a bronze by William Fitzenreiter (later briefly replaced by another by Wieland Förster);36 Vater und Sohn (Father and Son), a sandstone

Plate 19 Irmela and Martin Hadelich, ‘Die Erde hat Genug Brot für Alle’ [section of work] (The Earth has Enough Bread for All), Halle-Neustadt, 1968. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2011.

35 Dagmar Schmidt, ‘Kunst im öffentlichen Raum’, in Stadterneuerung als Prozess demokratischer und kultureller Weiterentwicklung (Dessau 1993), 69–107. 36 Two versions of ‘The Swimmer’ were commissioned for Halle-Neustadt: Wilhelm Fitzenreiter’s Die Schwimmerin and Wieland Förster’s Grosse Badende, Bronze, 1971. The first was moved by the council after a few weeks due to ‘protests by the residents’ through the local newspaper. The second was removed (and reportedly thrown onto a dump from where it was rescued) because the authorities had not realized there was an Ausstellungsverbot (ban on exhibiting) on the artist (Hütt, ‘Auftragsvergabe’, 1999, 391).

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sculpture by Rudolf Hilscher, who also made the bronze sculpture Taubenflug (Flight of Doves); Junges Paar (Young Pair), a bronze by Martin Wetzel; Ziegenreiterin (Goat Rider), a bronze by Martin Hadelich; and Sport, a concrete cast by Werner Stützer. Interior works – ceramic works, painting on wood, stained glass, for example Johannes Wagner’s Kinder und Ihre Umwelt (Children and their Environment) for three large windows of the Second Polytechnic High School (POS) – typically had playful, optimistic themes; paintings or sculptures of animals were especially used for children’s facilities. The socialist realist tradition was present in the references to folklore, internationalism, everyday life, family relationships and the natural world. The artworks, with their largely ‘picturesque’ forms, offered an organic, humanist counterpoint to the template-made building blocks. Nonetheless the scale and number of artworks was modest in comparison to the breadth and space of the architectural environments; in most cases, for example, the scale of the sculptures Die Afrikanerin and Vater und Sohn would have been more fitting for a gallery setting. The Hadelichs’ beautifully designed ceramic series of figures was at the appropriate scale but with reduced natural light or appropriate viewing conditions due to its passageway placement. These deficits in the planning were also picked up on by members of the public and caused discussion in the local press.37 In these examples the subject matter and often modest sizes within the scale of the architectural spaces do not signal artistic departures into the breadth and spaciousness of the new landscapes. In Living Complex One the architecture was completed without the cooperation of artists at planning stage, but even an attempt to correct this in Living Complex Three, which was given to the Dresden group PG Kunst am Bau, encountered problems in practice. The records reveal that the artists felt unable to conceptualize the spaces for art before they had the architects’ plans.38 In spite of these ongoing logistical obstacles, there were new trends which were to shape the built environment of the GDR. Even as theorists continued to discuss synthesis and problematize the place of art within architecture, what was gradually taking place in Halle-Neustadt and elsewhere was a partial move towards Complex Environmental Design – the drawing on different design specialisms to understand the entire urban landscape in relation to needs for work and recreation. Industrial designers invented cheaply reproduceable modular elements which could be used for varied applications as required. The vast open spaces between the housing blocks also offered potential for three-dimensional and semi-functional works of design which could

37

Czych, ZAG Seminar, Rostock, 1971, BArch DY/15 356, 65. ‘WK III, ‘Freiflächen und bildkünstlerische Gestaltung, 1966–1968’, LHASA, MER, M 514, Nr. 4797, 21.

38

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be focal points for communication and leisure to generate public enjoyment of outdoor space which seemed to be at risk in the planned developments. A common motif in GDR official photography displayed social life around works of design which encapsulated the ideals of wholesome play, community and communal ownership of space. Central to the representation of socialism, and in particular the promise of the modern era, were the optimal conditions of socialization and childhood; the physical centrality of children in these urban spaces was an essential corollary to their ideological significance. These were the new socialist landscapes, the built environment for socialist life. These constellations were not confined to residential areas but became part of urban ensembles in town centres too. The following types of art and design show how Complex Environmental Design was developing in Halle-Neustadt but also even earlier in the complexly designed open landscape of the extension to Alexanderplatz of Karl Marx Allee, formerly Stalinallee in Berlin.

Fountains Fountains were consistent with the understanding of the architectural plan primarily as the construction of a social and recreational space – in the broadest sense in which narrative, ideology, beauty and ornament could be manifest. The realist sculptures Junges Pärchen (Young Couple) by Martin Hadelich and Taubenflug (Flight of Doves) by Rudolf Hilscher in Living Complex One in HalleNeustadt were integrated into fountains, but subsequently fountains were to become a major artistic genre in their own right throughout the republic.39 For some artists, fountains and water features offered the opportunity to liberally interpret an assigned theme through abstract form, which would not have been acceptable as free-standing sculpture. The functionality of the fountain separated it from the culturally politicized domain of art and afforded this latitude to work in the abstract (Figure 4.3). The work of many artists is worthy of further attention, but space here permits only a small selection. Leonie Wirth (1935–2012) was one of the most innovative artist-craftspeople working primarily with metal or glass. Her fountains, Pusteblumen (Dandelions) (Figure 4.4)40 became synonymous with the central spacious pedestrian avenue of the reconstructed Prager Strasse in Dresden. Her

39 By 1989 Halle-Neustadt boasted another eight artistic fountains: Tulip Fountain (Heinz Bebernis, 1978), Women Fountain (Gerhard Lichtenfeld, 1974), Cactus Fountain (Peter Michael, 1983), Sea Fountain (Hans Rothe, 1983), The Alchemists’ Fountain (Martin Hadelich, 1974), the Hodscha Nassredin Fountain (Bernd Göbel, 1980) and Calling and Hearing (Wolfgang Dreysser, 1989). Many of these can be viewed online at https://m.halle.de/de/Kultur/Freizeit/?RecID=1679&Type=0#1679T and at https://www.halle-im-bild.de/ 40 Cooperation with Karl Bergmann and Josef Pietsch, 1969.

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Figure 4.3 Karl-Heinz Adler and Friedrich Kracht, ‘Zierbrunnen’ (Ornamental Fountain), Dresden-Neustadt, 1979. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek/ Hans Reinecke.

Figure 4.4 Leonie Wirth, ‘Pusteblumen’ (Dandelions), Dresden, 1969. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Richard sen. Peter.

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works were witty and light, benefiting from the interplay of the light, water and reflective and transparent materials. Wirth had trained as an architect and then an artist, rather than a craftsperson. Although loosely referring to plants and nature, her work became more abstracted, making it an example of successful adaptation of art to the new built environment. Other works include a golden glass fountain at the Robotron electronics complex in Dresden (Figure 4.5), ‘saucer’ fountains on Prager Strasse, and a wind and sound piece in a housing complex in Dresden Prohlis. Two graduates of Karl Müller and Lili Schulz at Burg Giebichenstein were to become leaders in the field of metal design: Irmtraud Ohme and Manfred Vollmert. Ohme’s Chemiebrunnen (Chemistry Fountain) (Figure 4.17, see p. 130) in HalleNeustadt is composed of pyramidal welded steel forms (Figure 4.6). In later years her work became more lyrical, for example the steel Mauresken in Halle (1987). Manfred Vollmert, a member of neue form in Seidewinkel, experimented with pure, economical, often geometric form (Figure 4.6). Using brass, steel, copper and silver plate, Vollmert’s output reflects the changing needs for applied arts (from product design to commemorative artefacts, to historicizing architectural elements) through which he explored abstract, geometric, tapered, economical forms. His fountains ranged from the entirely geometric, such as the copper Brunnenplastik (fountain sculpture) composed only of triangular forms (Nögenteichplatz, Rostock, 1976) and another copper piece composed of spherical forms (Knappensee, Koblenz, 1972),

Figure 4.5 Leonie Wirth, ‘Glasbrunnen’ (Glass Fountain), Dresden, 1975. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2019.

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Figure 4.6 Manfred Vollmert, ‘Brunnenplastik’ (Fountain Sculpture), Hoyerswerda, 1972. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013.

to others that blended geometric form with organic elements. In spite of Vollmert’s clear preoccupation with abstract form, a catalogue essay from 1987 still found a way to apply socialist realist criteria in its critique by aligning his work with the needs of people. The forms and its details are so well aligned with societal relations . . . Is it not good and realistic at the same time when this fountain emphatically helps those searching for quiet and relaxation in a park . . . Such designs have communicative character insofar as they can lead people away from the undesired anonymity of modern technology.41

Reliefs and structural elements Tschierschky’s arguments for a kind of modular realism in the form of mould-made artistic ceramic or concrete serial elements, both free-standing and as facades, were realized in practice in the new built environments, though always as fully abstract and not semi-representational elements. These were justified as offsetting the much discussed ‘danger of urban monotony’, particularly in ‘the experiential area of the entry zones’.42 According to the conception for Living Complex Three, perforated structural walls should also delineate space, conceal washing hanging areas, and offer interest in the areas where young people would congregate. As

41 Eberhard Neubert, ‘Brunnen von Manfred Vollmert’ in Manfred Vollmert, (Rat des Bezirkes Cottbus: Cottbus, 1987), 6–7. 42 ‘WK III, Freiflächen und bildkünstlerische Gestaltung, 1966–1968’, LHASA, MER, M 514, Nr. 4797.

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with the fountains, they were to support socialist living.43 Architects Richard Paulick and Armin Menzel designed abstract reliefs on the gable facades of housing blocks in Halle-Neustadt; a concrete modular structure designed by Kurt Grohmann and Klaus Fleischmann was used to delineate space in the small shopping complex in Living Complex One; Christian Brade created an enamel and metal spatial divider in the self-service cafe, Gastronom; and Willi Neubert was commissioned to create two decorative works to visually enhance the through ways built into the 385-metre long ‘Block 10’. However, Neubert’s first attempt did not sufficiently make the separation between abstraction – acceptable in applied art but unacceptable in ‘art’. The work was removed, with no explanation, and Neubert was never to see it again.44 Therefore, whilst remunerated as ‘art’, these works had to be understood as works of design or applied art to pass the contract giver. Neubert’s second and accepted version (included in the national exhibition of architecture and art in 1969) was an interleaving structure of steel and enamel coloured half-folded circle forms (Figure 4.7).

Playgrounds, play sculptures, children and animals Sculptures of children and of animals were popular works in the urban and natural landscape and had also been present on the realist detailing of the architecture of national tradition. As realist works, they could be set in the contemporary and at the same time metaphorical moment – for example, children (boys) playing at building or flying toy planes in the reconstruction period, and after modernization, on scooters, youths on motorbikes, playing guitars and listening to music. The animal sculptures of Otto Leibe (Halle), Jürgen von Woyski (Hoyerswerda Zoo) and Stephan Horota (Berlin) (Plate 33) were often animated and playful but not kitsch portrayals. Peter Michael’s Regenwurm, einen Pilz und zwei Blüten (Earthworm, a Mushroom and Two Petals) and Leibe’s Schildkröte (Tortoise) use the absurdity of monumental scale for small creatures to create humour. Spielelefant (Play Elephant) by Leibe, a concrete cast, made a stylized elephant into a children’s slide and climbing apparatus in Halle-Neustadt’s Living Complex One. This represented an innovation in the use of cast concrete – a development that was nonetheless subject to discussion as to its suitability for playgrounds. The design of play apparatus was an interdisciplinary area of design research which expanded in the 1970s and 1980s with its own department at Burg Giebichenstein. Whilst modular systems were developed for play apparatus, there were also many singular artistic works.

43

Ibid. Information from Willi Neubert in interview with the author.

44

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Figure 4.7 Willi Neubert, Enamel on steel structure, Halle-Neustadt, 1965/6. © VG BILD-KUNST, Bonn/Neubert, Willi / SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Henrik Ahlers.

Typographic design Typographic design began to make an entry as part of the planning process. In Halle-Neustadt the centrally located Gastronom cafe in Living Complex One was given contemporary signage lettering by Helmut Brade and Wilhelm Schneid.45 The bold sans-serif, lightly rounded square typographic forms are in this case coherent with the form of the architecture. Nonetheless, a decorative pictorial reference to a doily or tablecloth around the G seemed to be added as a compensation for the raw geometry of the typeface. In the capital Berlin there were more sophisticated examples of urban typography from one of the most prominent graphic designers, Klaus Wittkügel. Wittkügel designed typographic signage as part of the new residential developments of the second section of Karl Marx Allee.46

45

Dagmar Schmidt, ‘Kunst im öffentlichen Raum’, 69–82. The urban plan for the extension to Alexanderplatz of the 1950s Stalinallee to the Modernist Second Section was developed by Edmund Collein and Werner Dutschke, selected from a 1958 competition expedited by the West German Government’s provocative competition ‘Capital Berlin’ (the FRG Capital was Bonn). Hans Schmidt also submitted a design in line with his conception of the socialist Living Complex. The foundation stone was laid on 6 October 1959. architekturbüro meyer grosse hebestreit sommerer / landschafts.architektur birgit hammer, 2015. https://www.kma-mitte.de/kmaimages/infopdf/erhaltungsverordnung_2015_begruendung.pdf 46

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Plate 18 Klaus Wittkugel typography, Berlin, 1965. Photograph © Stefan Trummer.

The LKW Tatra Motokov (Plate 18) and Balkan Car Podom (1964) advertising which topped the new residential blocks of the avenue stood as identifiers of those buildings, lending the expansive avenue an appropriate urbanity, leading into the commercial Alexanderplatz. For the Café Moskau, a prestige restaurant on the same street, Wittkügel designed a Futura-esque Modernist typographic signage.

Material innovation The traditional techniques such as sgraffito and stone reliefs gave way to innovations with techniques and materials, although mosaics, stained glass, brick and ceramic tile works continued to be popular. The most important entry for artistic work was concrete and in the later years of the GDR, when budgets were reduced, concrete took the place of bronze for large-scale sculpture. Plastic and synthetics were also to become more common for street furnishings. In 1964, Schmied and Geyer, together with the architects for Halle-Neustadt, worked with specialists at the Buna chemical plant to explore a range of applications of artificial materials for interior furnishings for latex paint, and for plastic decorative elements within architecture.47 These were realized in the so-called Plasteblock (plastics block) in Zscherbener Strasse, constructed in

47 ‘Neue Kunststoff für die bildende Kunst’, BK 9/1964, 502–3. Apart from the Plasteblock there is no evidence that these experiments in form making found any real application in architectural decoration.

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1967–8. This was an experimental building with plastic materials used for the exterior, roof, doors, windows, flooring, interior cladding and sanitary facilities. However, the experiment proved too expensive to repeat. An electrostatic process of applying colour through pigment blasting to the surface was developed for a work of art for the Halle-Neustadt cinema by Fritz Freitag and Doris Froöde.48 This was used in a much more prominent example in Gerhard Bondzin’s monumental Der Weg der Roten Fahne (The Path of the Red Flag; 1969) on the Kulturpalast in Dresden (Figures 0.1 and 0.2). As with other prestige Modernist-style buildings in city centres, the addition of the firmly socialist realist mural (a more abstracted design by Rudolf Sitte was rejected in a controversial selection process) anchored the socialist communicative function.49 Bondzin’s composition was blasted with coloured glass splinters onto 466 rectangular concrete sections. There is no pretentiousness here about the artistic means or process; the possibilities of new technology were embraced in a way which was consistent with the architecture. One of the most important innovations was the development of industrial enamel for murals, pioneered by the former steelworker Willi Neubert. Neubert, Sitte and Peter Preiss used this for three flanking monumental works in Suhl (1977) (Plates 7); Ronald Paris also used the technique with stencils in Karl Marx Stadt (created 1973, erected 1980). The enamel could be poured into moulds for cleancut colours or, with more difficulty, used in a painterly way. Adler together with ceramicist Harry Schulze at the Institute for Structural Theory at the TU Dresden made groundbreaking research into construction materials and ceramic glazes.

Plate 7 Willi Neubert, ‘International Solidarität’ (International Solidarity), Suhl, 1977. Photograph (Thale) © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 48

NW 31.10.68 newscutting from AdK archive. Rudolf Sitte’s proposal was considered not ‘expressive in its message’, ‘effective’ or ‘optimistic’ enough for the significance of the location. ‘Vorlage für die Ratssitzung, Dresden am 12.10. 1967 (10.10.67)’. Reference provided by Antje Kirsch, Kunst+Bau, Dresden. See also: Christiane Fülscher ‘Der Weg der Roten Fahne’ (Journal of Architecture and Urbanism, Vol. 37(4): 292–300, 2013) doi:10 .3846/20297955.2013.866861 49

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Plate 8 Willi Neubert, ‘300 Jahre Eisenhüttenwerk’ (300 Years of the Steel Works), Thale, 1985. © J. R. Jenkins 2013.

Innovation with traditional materials Alongside these material innovations, the proliferation of both exterior and interior artistic craft provided opportunities to experiment with the possibilities of traditional materials such as glass, ceramics (for example, Dieter Graupner of the Dresden artists’ collective Kunst+Bau) and wood. In this context two highly accomplished ‘wood artists’ should be mentioned. Lüder Baier (1920–2012), who worked from the Hellerau Workshops in Dresden, completed numerous commissions in the realm of interior architectural art for offices, restaurants, cinemas and cultural centres, including the Dresden Kulturpalast and government buildings. In contrast to Baier’s exquisite reworkings of the lines and shapes of the wood, Hans Brockhage, a student of Mart Stam and Marianne Brandt, often chose to expose the wood’s natural roughness, even creating one work in concrete which imitated tree bark for the Stadthalle in Karl Marx Stadt. Another example of the opportunities afforded to artist craftspeople through architectural art is found in the glass work of Reginald Richter based in Magdeburg. Together with Marga and Richard Hamann and Richard Wilhelm, Richter formed a craftworkers collective, Werkgenossenschaft Glasgestaltung Magdeburg (Collective Glass Design Magdeburg)50 and was responsible for multiple prestige objects in glass such as the popular Gläserne Blume (Glass Flower) together with Richard O. Wilhelm for the interior of the Palast der Republik in 1975/6. Again, there is no clear separation between the artist, designer or craftworker in terms of the identification of the work or the professional practice,

50

Forum Gestaltung, Magdeburg. http://forum-gestaltung.de/reginald-richter-glas/

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but the high number of commissions for public spaces allowed considerable creative exploration for artists who also commanded technical skills or who could work together with craftspeople. The landscape planning around the new open-plan residential section of Karl Marx Allee in Berlin51 was ahead of that in Halle-Neustadt, but followed similar patterns where art was to become more functional (Figure 4.8). It included a concrete play apparatus by Baldur Schönfelder called Moon Station (Figure 4.15, see p. 130),52 fountains, splashing pools for children by Margit Schötschel-Gabriel and Fritz Kühn and steel chairs designed by Fritz and Achim Kühn. Ceramicist Regina Jung created a structural wall which combined individually formed elliptical spherical ceramics in a vertical abacus construction enclosed within cast concrete modules. Such hybrid art-design-craft functional and aesthetic pieces for the complexes behind the central avenue leading to Alexanderplatz were complemented by decorative and narrative murals which were integrated within the prestige buildings on the main thoroughfare, such as Bert Heller’s 1960 mosaic, From the Lives of the Peoples of the Soviet Union on the Café Moskau (architect, Josef Kaiser), a mosaic portraying different ethnic groups from the Soviet Union which spans both the interior and exterior space of the entrance, and From the Lives of People Today (1964) by Waldemar Grzimek, Hubert Schiefelbein and Karl-Heinz Schamal. This latter, a white relief facade on the Kino International (architect, Josef Kaiser), illustrates a careful interplay between the necessary narrative of socialist realism and the contemporaneous interest in geometric form making.

Complex Environmental Design in practice In these ensembles we can see the composite elements of the socialist urban landscape as they began to develop over the 1960s and into the next decade. Artistic craftwork found its place within abstract and semi-abstract works, which could at the same time be appreciated as works of art. Murals and mosaics with the established socialist themes continued to be integrated within prestigious buildings. Colour design, greenery, spatial and surface structures, play apparatus, water features and typography became integral parts of the environmental design. (In the 1970s and 1980s the potential of typographic design was further exploited to generate a feeling of urbanism or historicism in city centres.) Creative and economic solutions for modular elements which could be mass-produced for functional and communication design such as seating, waste bins, play

51

See note 304. Technical realization: Friedrich Lude und Klaus Keller.

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PLAN FOR WORKS OF ART AND DESIGN IN THE LIVING COMPLEXES OF KARL MARX ALLEE 1962 Exterior sculpture Interior sculpture Exterior colour ceiling + wall mural Interior colour ceiling + wall mural Exterior relief Interior relief Exterior basin for plants Interior basin for plants Advertising graphics Play sculpture Water pool

1. Haus des Lehrers (House of the Teachers) 2. Restaurant Moskau 3. Kino 600 (Kino International: cinema) 4. Hotel Berlin Tourist 5. Living Complex Centre 6. S Bahnhof (Station) Jannowitzbrücke 7. Kinderkrippe/ Nursery (under 3 years old) 8. Kindergarten/ Nursery (over 3 years old) Adapted from preliminary plan by VEB Berlin-Projekt “Autorenkollektiv Karl Marx Allee” published in Deutsche Architektur April/May, 1962.

Figure 4.8 Plan for works of art and design in the Living Complexes of Karl Marx Allee, 1962. Drawing © J. R. Jenkins, based on VEB Berlin-Projekt ‘Autorenkollektiv Karl Marx Allee’.

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Plate 9 Ingrid Müller Kuberski, ‘Chemie und Landwirtschaft’ (Chemistry and Agriculture), Tapestry (graduation piece), 1961. Photograph © Joachim Blobel 2006. Custody Sammlung Burg Giebichenstein, Kunsthochschule Halle.

apparatus, lighting, as well as elements for information and advertising were embraced by industrial designers and became part of the catalogue of designed objects to be included in complex planning of new districts.53 The importance attached to the prestige function of architectural art helped secured the place of artistic textiles in the 1960s in the face of the shift towards industrial design (Plate 9, Figures 4.10, 4.11and 4.12). Tapestry design had been gradually re-established at Burg over the 1950s. A middle German tradition, it had gone into decline in the Third Reich: at Burg Willi Sitte saw an opportunity to re-invent it as a modern socialist form. In 1940s-50s France, modernists Sonia Delaunay, Picasso, André Bloc, Fernand Léger and Le Corbusier had renewed the idea of a ‘synthesis of the arts’, their colourful abstract textile forms confounding the esteemed grey concrete of modernist architecture.54 But it was the semi-figurative tapestries of Jean Lurçat, Jean Picart le Doux and Marc Saint-Saëns which provided the Burg students with inspiration as they sought innovative ways to integrate figuration and allegory within the economical aesthetic possibilities of the tapestry.55 Sitte, with the assistance of Irmgard 53 The design journal form+zweck featured many such design concepts, for example, ‘Bemühen um Synthese: Formgestaltungsprogramm Karl-Marx-Stadt’, form+zweck 1 (1970), 22–32. 54 On the free-standing mural as a Modernist medium see Romy Golan, Muralnomad: The Paradox of Wall Painting, Europe 1927–1957 (Newhaven: Yale University Press, 2009). 55 Ingrid Müller-Kuberski, email correspondance with the author, August, 2020.

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Figure 4.9 Inge Götze, ‘Lob der Poesie’ (In Praise of Poetry), Appliqué, 1972. Part of a triptych with the themes, chosen by the artist, Music, the Poet and the Theatre. The work was planned for a library in the University of Jena which ultimately was not built. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Waltraud Rabich.

Glauche set up the new department of textiles in 1952 and seized each rare opportunity to expose the Burg students to the French modernists. The works for state representative purposes interwove the motifs of socialist narrative with exquisite rhythmic forms and colour sensitivity. This was one of the few areas of art where female artists were not confined to the margins and, as with other applied arts, there was more latitude for experiment into abstraction. In 1968, a re-organisation prioritizing industrial design over the applied arts saw a separation of textile art and textile design at Burg. Sitte was able to use his close connections with the Party apparatus to establish the department of tapestry design (Bildteppichgestaltung) in 1972 with Inge Götze at its head.56 Götze diversified the practice of textile art and sought to release it from the constraints of realism, bringing widespread acclaim to the department. Halle-Neustadt with its proximity to Burg Giebichenstein benefited from several

56 Inge Götze in correspondance with the author, 2020 ; Rataiczyk M. and Müller-Wenzel, C., Gewebte Träume (Halle: Kunstverein Talstrasse, 2016)..

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Figure 4.10 Willi Sitte, ‘Freundschaft’ (Friendship), Production: Ilse-Maria Krause, 1958. Photograph © Joachim Blobel 2006 (original in colour). Custody Sammlung Burg Giebichenstein, Kunsthochschule Halle.

tapestries, including Gertraud Schaar’s Die Post Verbindet Städte, Länder und Kontinenten (The Post Connects Towns, Countries and Continents; 1970) in the Room of Culture in the Post Office,57 Inge Götze’s Das Leben in Sozialismus (Life in Socialism; 1977) in a registry office and Rosemarie and Werner Rataiczyk’s Die Lernende Frau (The Learning Woman; 1971) at the Restaurant Treff. These works were highly inventive, integrating realist tropes and human and animal figures within abstracted forms. As these new socialist landscapes emerged, anxiety about the potential monotony and lack of visible socialist distinctiveness of the systemized architecture persisted. This was seized upon by artists as a chance to reassert

57

Realization by Erika Fischer, Resi Ristau and Gertrud Weber.

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Figure 4.11 Martina Stark, ‘Die Biologin’ (The Biologist), 1979. Photograph © Joachim Blobel 2006 (original in colour). Custody Sammlung Burg Giebichenstein, Kunsthochschule Halle.

the importance of the role of the artist in the early planning stages. In the regional VBKD Halle, Willi Sitte, Willi Neubert and critic Wolfgang Hütt developed a manifesto-like ‘memorandum’58 entitled ‘A New Synthesis of the Arts’.59 In this, the new profession of designer was placed alongside the artist as decisive in the formation of the socialist environment, which the group then reinforced in a special edition newspaper called Architektur und bildende Kunst (Architecture and Art) in 1969.60 This edition drew together many of the themes which had 58 The memorandum ‘Suggestions for Improvements in the Artistic Achievements in Socialist Urban Design’ was signed by Sitte, Neubert and Hütt, July 1967, AdK VBK-BV-Halle – 188. 59 ‘Für eine neue Synthese von Architektur und bildender Kunst’, AdK VBK-BV-Halle – 188. 60 ‘Architektur und Bildende Kunst im Bezirk Halle’, special edition published by the Chief Architect of Halle. Editorial board: Karlheinz Schlesier, Wilhelm Schmied, Artur Jungblut, Manfred Müller, Sigbert Fliegel.

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become current in the preceding two to three years and was openly critical of failings in planning, and the absence of solutions for physical and social spaces between buildings which were appropriate to the scale. Sitte sought to rectify the lack of ateliers and absence of coordination between artists and architects with a new research and development centre at Burg Giebichenstein in 1970 covering fine art, decorative art, craft, form design, colour design and light design with material research in metal, enamel, plastic, glass, concrete and ceramics. He revived production workshops, such as a stained-glass workshop in Quedlingburg, which had been nationalized and integrated them into the school.61 For Sitte this was ‘the Bauhaus idea in the phase of realisation’. The applied arts, which had been crucial to socialist realism in the 1950s, were guaranteed status and support as Werkkunst through the need for architectural art. However the disputes around the Kulturpalast mural in Dresden (1969) – culminating in the choice of Bondzin’s highly didactic narrative (Figures 0.1 and 0.2) over Rudolf Sitte’s proposal for a semi-abstract relief – show that there was a strong desire on the part of the Party authorities to reinforce the visibly socialist, pedagogical nature of art. Whilst the applied arts and design afforded considerable latitude within realism, the status quo of socialist realist art remained through the thematic frameworks assigned to urban developments.

Figure 4.12 Gerhard Bondzin, ‘Mensch und Natur’ (Man and Nature), Cottbus, 1980. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013. 61 Gisela Schirmer, Willi Sitte, Farben und Folgen: Eine Autobiographie (Leipzig: Faber & Faber, 2003), 168–9.

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Iconography and interpretation Whilst the limited tropes of socialist realism in its first phase has often been held up as reason for its inevitable exhaustion, this argument can be dismissed through comparison with artistic traditions with far greater longevity and an even more restricted set of tropes, most obviously the art of Christianity. The Renaissance brought humanism to Christian art and developed understanding of the representation of space, but this artistic flowering over 200 years was achieved largely through set-piece Christian imagery. Socialist realism of the early years sought to impress a set of communal values through set pieces such as The Brigade, The Meeting, The Factory Worker, The Reader, and so on. These developed in the 1960s with the addition of scientific and cosmonaut themes (Figures 4.13 to 4.21), youth culture and a greater emphasis on the educated person. The artistic means by which these set pieces were interpreted varied widely, from linear graphic forms such as Rudolf Grunemann’s set of scientific motifs within a housing estate in Schwedt (Figure 4.16) to painterly, expressionist works such as Sitte’s enamel for Suhl. With each development in the means

Figure 4.13 Gerhard Geyer, ‘Vier Wissenschaftler aus vier Jahrhunderten’ (Four Scientists from Four Centuries), Halle-Neustadt, 1972. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Henrik Ahlers.

Figure 4.14 Senta Baldamus, ‘Chemieingenieurin’ (Chemistry Engineer), Bronze, Halle-Neustadt, 1970/3. Photograph © Dagmar Schmidt 1993.

Figure 4.15 Baldur Schönfelder, ‘Mondstation’ (Moon Station), play apparatus, Berlin, 1972. © Bundesarchiv, Bild 183L0805-0006 / Junge, Peter Heinz.

Figure 4.16 Rudolph Grunemann, ‘Chemie und Landwirtschaft’ (Chemistry and Agriculture), Schwedt/Oder, 1967. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2012.

Figure 4.17 Irmtraud Ohme ‘Chemiebrunnen’ (Chemistry Fountain), Halle-Neustadt, 1971. Photograph © Jim Cooper.

Figure 4.18 Walter Womacka, ‘Die Wissenschaft erobern’ (Conquer Science), Berlin, 1962. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2012.

Figure 4.19 Fritz Eisel, ‘Der Mensch bezwingt den Kosmos’ (Man Conquers the Cosmos), Potsdam, 1972. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2012.

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Figure 4.20 Erich Enge, ‘Kosmonaut’ (Cosmonaut), Schwedt, 1967. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2012.

of painting or designing, the range of kinds of work became more varied and interesting. The themes set out in the 1965 plan for Halle-Neustadt were loosely interpreted. The science theme was interpreted in multiple ways and media, from Gerhard Geyer’s Wissenschaftswürfel (Science Cube) (Figure 4.20)62 to Senta Baldamus’s Chemieingenieurin (Chemistry Engineer), a female figure in contemporary attire situated in the space between housing blocks which represented the socialist ideal of the position of the well-educated woman of the 1960s (Figure 4.14). Elsewhere science was represented through symbols or chemistry apparatus, as in Wilhelm Schmied’s two narrative painted ceramic panels of interwoven symbols across the main entrance of the Polytechnic High School or Irmtraud Ohme’s abstract Chemiebrunnen (Chemistry Fountain) in Halle town, Benzolringen (Benzol Rings) by a student collective under Walter Funkat from Burg which marked the entrance to Halle-Neustadt, as well as an aluminium structure which stretched across Halle’s Haus des Lehrers at Thälmannplatz.63 Martin Wetzel’s bronze Alchemistenbrunnen

62 Georg Ernst Stahl (Chemiker/Physiker/Mediziner, 1660–1734); Friedrich August Wolf (Altphilologe/ Altertumswissenschaftler, 1759–1824); Viktor Klemperer (Romanist, 1881–1960); Georg Cantor (Mathematiker, 1845–1918). 63 ‘Architektur und bildende Kunst im Bezirk Halle. Ausstellung in den Messehallen im Kulturpark Peißnitz vom 1. Juni bis 6. Juli 1969’ (Halle: Rat des Bezirkes Halle, 1969).

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(Alchemists’ Fountain; 1968), constructed with comical figures, offered a humorous counterpoint to the overarching significance of chemistry in the town. Propaganda was present in compulsory collective rather than individual aspiration, for example in relation to the collective drive to industrial production from which society and thus socialism was to benefit. The ongoing affirmative, joyful and optimistic tone of the works and the choices of historical narratives remained true to realist ideals. Overtly political works, including history and culture related to politics, in Halle-Neustadt up until 1989 made up just 23 per cent of the total.64 In contrast to the modernity of architectural production, the works of art rarely achieved the same technological or industrial scale, but tended rather to anaesthetize the rawness of the architecture. The modern socialist personality, developing a modern socialist way of life, so enthused about in the conception of Halle-Neustadt, seemed to be offered a kind of artistic comfort zone of craft and ornament on a human scale. The works comply with a scheme of socialist realist characteristics developed by Leonid Heller in ‘A World of Prettiness’.65 Based on an analysis of Soviet journals from 1948 to 1952, Heller identifies ‘Stalinist predicates of aesthetic judgement’. The terms which recur are ‘beautiful’, ‘sublime’, ‘naïve’ and ‘picturesque’.66 With the exception of ‘sublime’, these can be applied to examples of architectural art in the GDR; in particular, the tendency to the naïve, children’s picture book depictions was evident, even in buildings unrelated to children, suggesting that the architectural art was to act as a counterpoint to the effects of modern urbanism, and indeed modern life. What actually emerged in practice was a kind of realpolitik for art. It was the beginnings of a pattern that was to re-emerge across the republic, where art was not exactly in synthesis with architecture but functioned more as a catharsis.

The challenge of Complex Environmental Design in the late 1960s Throughout the late 1960s Hans Schmidt and his colleagues at the Bauakademie continued to develop a theory of socialist architecture, with Flierl in particular refining a theory of Complex Environmental Design. An important landmark was

64

Peer Pasternak, Zwischen Halle-Novgorod und Halle-New Town, 2012, 32. Leonid Heller, ‘A World of Prettiness: Socialist Realism and its Aesthetic Categories’, in Evgeniı˘ Dobrenko and Thomas Lahusen (eds), Socialist Realism Without Shores (Durham: Duke University Press, 1997), 51–76. 66 Ibid, 63. 65

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the publication in 1967 of a working document to a small circle of readers, ‘Contributions to Architectural Research, Architecture and Art’.67 This applied scientific theories, which would be applicable to different societal forms, but which for the GDR necessarily were founded on a Marxist-Leninist model. (By implication, Marxist-Leninism was just one possible model.) A key point to emerge was the separation of the ideological function of architecture from its material manifestation. These shifts towards a concept of environmental design (Umweltgestaltung) in response to Modernist architecture were also developing in the West, but Flierl and colleagues specifically aimed to make a case for the ‘socialist environment’ where socialist life processes and the socialist personality would unfold. Flierl sought to bring the ideas within ‘Contributions’ to a wider public, and in particular to artists. In the April 1968 issue of Bildende Kunst68 he developed his theory that the two disciplines of art and architecture were subsystems within the larger societal system of socialism; he elaborated on this again a month later at a special plenum of the Deutsche Akademie der Künste in May 1968.69 Flierl used the ‘non-public working conference’70 to present his ideas on the role of the ‘socialist human community’ in the formation of the built environment and its art, with a focus on the still latent plans for monumental Lenin and Marx monuments in Berlin, of which Flierl was highly critical. Using a series of diagrams, he demonstrated the overbearing impact these monumental busts would have in public space and argued for a more interpretive representation of socialism.71 He rejected the ideal of a synthesis of architecture with art, which was not possible since art and architecture functioned in different ways (art was expressive, architecture was function-oriented). Furthermore, Flierl sought to correct the idea that art should provide the expression for architecture, since content was derived from life, not the physical artefact.72 Although he was elaborating ideas which had already been published, there was a sharp political reaction. His definition of the role of ‘socialist human community’ and discussions of the Lenin and Marx monuments questioned the authority of the Party and orthodox ideas of realism.

67 ‘Beiträge zur architekturtheoretischen Forschung: Diskussionsmaterial’ (Berlin: Institut für Städtebau und Architektur, 1967). 68 Bruno Flierl, ‘Zur Diskussion gestellt: Synthese von Architektur und bildende Kunst im Wandeln’ (based on the ‘Beiträge. . .’), BK 1968/4, 211–14. 69 ‘Plenartagung der Deutschen Akademie der Künste am 31.5.1968 zu Fragen der bildende Kunst und Architektur’, ADK-O 0652. 70 The delegates consisted of 27 members of the ADK, 13 staff members and 22 guests, who included Paulick, Fliegel and Bach to speak about the experience of working with artists in Halle-Neustadt. The other main delegates were Building Ministry Deputy Richhorn, Bathke, Alfred Schubert (SED), Lammert, Olbrich, Kuhirt, Gerhardt Schmidt, Wiese, Frankenstein, Woyski and Wittkügel. ADK-O 0652, 53–4. 71 Ibid, 80–4. 72 Bruno Flierl, presentation, special plenary meeting on the problems of architecture and art at the Deutsche Akademie der Künste, 31.05.1968, ADK-O 0652, 66.

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The content of Flierl’s paper was reported to the Building Ministry by the vice president of the Academy, Hans Rodenburg, as ‘destructive’.73 The building minister, Wolfgang Junker, a hardliner with no time for Flierl, in turn accused Ule Lammert, vice president of the Bauakademie, where Flierl was employed, of promoting ideas which contravened cultural policy.74 Flierl immediately recognized the potentially explosive nature of the accusation (i.e. counter-revolutionary activity) and hastily expressed his allegiance with the Bauakademie, distancing himself from the Akademie der Künste, and requested that his contribution should not be published, since ‘it just represented his personal opinions’.75 Although the dilemma of giving ideological content to the new architecture required theoretical work, if such advances appeared to be critical of the authority of the Central Committee or challenged a cohesive class identity by raising the ‘societal person’, then they were immediately halted. At the same time, the principle of complexity had been partially accepted by the authorities in the sense of integrating different specialisms, including artistic and scientific, through a ‘complex’ approach which could be absorbed within the latent idea of an ‘artistic’ approach to architecture. For example, in January 1968, Kurt Hager, head of the ideological commission of the Politbüro, reinforced the importance of socialist realism to the ZK at the same time as refashioning it, insisting that a GDR typical socialist architecture must be ‘an inseparable unity between the mastery of the scientific technical revolution and the development of socialist realism’, which could only be achieved through the ‘complex inter-effectiveness of architects with scientists, economists, technologists, engineers, innovators and not least artists’.76 The ambivalent readings of Complex Environmental Design were also evident in the main addresses given at the 1970 Artists’ Union Congress (VBKD), the central theme of which was ‘The position of art in the system of socialist environmental design’.77 Minister of Culture Klaus Gysi’s opening address was a combative reassertion of the separate and singular artistic development in socialist realism, an insistence on the centrality of ‘monumentality’ and ‘beauty’ (‘the aesthetic evaluation of reality as the highest form of commitment to the

73

Confidential memo by Hossinger, head of the ADK, on a meeting with Lammert, vice president of the

DBA, presented to Konrad Wolf, Berlin 29.07.68. The correspondence suggests that this was not a conscious sabbotage on the part Rodenberg. ADK-O 0652, 28–9. 74 Summary of a phone call from Lammert of the DBA to Hossinger of the DAK 12.07.68, ADK-O 0652, 21. 75 Letter from Flierl to Hossinger, director of the DAK 09.07.68, ADK-O 0652, 20. 76 Kurt Hager, 4. Tagung der ZK der SED, 30 January 1968, ‘Ideologische Probleme des Städtebaus und der Architektur’, BK 1968/4, 210–11. 77 ‘Information an alle Mitglieder und Kandidaten des Politbüros zum VI. Verbandskongreß’ 28–30.04.1970 in Berliner Kongresshalle am Alex (confidential report on the conference, signed Rossow), 02.06.1970, AdK, VBK Zentralvorstand – 906 (5469).

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Party’)78 in socialist art, and a firm rejection of ‘convergence theory’ – a coded reference to Flierl’s ideas on monumentality.79 Gysi claimed tendencies were evident which ‘reduce the clarification of ideological and artistic questions of monumental art and the synthesis of building art and image art to structural questions and thus de-value socialist realism’.80 The address of Gerhard Bondzin, president of the VBKD, which followed, reaffirmed the centrality of the monumental, but then proceeded to set out the

Figure 4.21 Erich Enge, ‘Lenin’s Worte wurden Wahr’ (Lenin’s Words Came True), Halle-Neustadt, 1971. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013.

78 Klaus Gysi address, VI. Verbandskongress, 28.04.– 30.04.70, AdK, VBK Zentralvorstand – 906 (5469). 79 Ibid. 80 Ibid.

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tasks of Complex Environmental Design.81 The design of cities and complexes was increasingly important ‘for the formation of the socialist way of life’;82 the conception of the city as the ‘built environment for socialist life’ promoted by Flierl, Schmidt and others was thus acknowledged. However, the crucial difference was the continued insistence on art, which held the ideological balance between an orthodox realism and the danger of encroaching Modernism. In Bondzin’s formulation: The sum of all functions of the city, even when optimally integrated, do not alone form a city in the sense of the constructed spatial ordering of the socialist way of life and its forming influence on the socialist human community. Beyond this there is a ‘plus’ in needs which are necessary for socialist society. This ‘plus’, the aesthetic artistic form of the city, will become the starting point for the artistic work and design.83 Those aspects of Flierl’s ideas which related to an integrative approach to planning were accepted; the difficulties arose in accepting the social scientific element which implied social differentiation. Whilst acknowledging complexity, the authorities reasserted ‘monumentality’, a need for which was satisfied temporarily through some new commissions such as Erich Enge’s Lenin’s Worte wurden Wahr (Lenin’s Words Become True) in Halle-Neustadt (Figure 4.21) and Nikolai Tomski’s 1970 Lenin monument in Berlin, unveiled in Lenin’s centenary year. In the next chapter we will see how some of the artists in Halle-Neustadt did push the boundaries of architectural art and sought in different ways to achieve something more ambitious and perhaps more monumental than the works typically integrated into the built environment.

81 Gerhard Bondzin, Die Position der Kunst im System des sozialistischen Umweltgestaltungs. VI Verbandskongress. 82 Ibid, 40. 83 Ibid.

Chapter 5 Expanding the Remit of Realism in the Public Art of Halle-Neustadt

Whilst the evident uncertainty at Politbüro level about the socialist distinctiveness of the new urban landscapes resulted in the calls for more monumentality and a reassertion of ‘synthesis’ – innovations were taking place which in some ways already met the demand for new forms of monumentality by combining avantgardist approaches to materials, media and pictorial language with the demands of realism. These are given individual attention here because of the unique and creative ways they balanced material and logistical constraints with artistic vision, even though only two of the four were realized. All from Halle-Neustadt, they demonstrate the ways in which artists innovated on their own terms. Each is particular to the artist’s own way of working and interests, and they all found ways to expand the remit of realism.

Willi Neubert’s Lebensbaum (1966) and the development of industrial enamel Innovation in material and muralist composition and narrative Willi Neubert (1920–2011) had been a steelworker in his hometown of Thale in Harz which had a 200-year old enamel industry. The founding of the GDR saw him delegated by the ruling SED to study art at Burg Giebichenstein in 1950.1 His biography exemplified the Bitterfeld principle as he retained his connection to the steel industry and workers’ brigades whilst becoming a socialist realist painter. Together with the factory laboratory, Neubert researched the possibilities of adapting industrial enamel into a more fluid medium for architectural art, which led to the foundation of the Institute for Industrial Enamel in 1970 within Burg Giebichenstein.2

1

AdK Künstlerbiografie Willi Neubert. Five to seven students each year were trained under the leadership of painter Peter Preiss.

2

137

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Plate 5 Willi Neubert, ‘Die Presse als Kollektiver Organisator’ (The Press as Collective Organiser), Halle, 1964. © DACS 2020 / Neubert.

Neubert first tested his method for a commission in the town of Halle: a mural titled Die Presse als Kollektive Organisator (The Press as Collective Organizer) for the regional Party newspaper Freiheit (Plate 5). The mural was situated on the front of the Freiheit building in 1964 and given a ceremonial unveiling. Neubert also used this work to experiment away from the compositional conventions of realism. He recounted to me: In [The Press] I was thinking more of painting. After that I was much freer. Because I put these things in the figure which nobody had dared to do. I was a bit inspired by Mexican [muralism]. The figure is a symbol for the working class (Arbeiterschaft). It was new to use these different proportions.3 The Press demonstrates the break into ‘muralism’ indebted to the Mexican tradition, where there is no naturalistic composition; narrative elements are enclosed within the central figure – a montage construction possibly referring to Diego Rivera’s 1953 A Popular History of Mexico on the Teatro de los Insurgentes in Mexico City. (Walter Womacka, who was also fascinated by the Mexican tradition, likewise used this method in his 1967 Eisenhüttenstadt mural Collective Work of Socialist Countries (Plates 13 and 14).) Die Presse has the male figure at its centre and within its montage construction, the repertoire of socialist realist themes: agriculture, mining, heavy industry, chemistry, science and learning. If we follow the figure to the hands of the man, we see in one the symbol of chemistry, and in the other the symbol of peace: man’s mastery of science for peaceful purposes. The defeat of fascism no longer makes an appearance. The socialist realist tableau here is divorced from history and the narrative takes place entirely in the present, nonetheless with the visionary purpose of scientific research. The only female presence is in the single role of the chemistry worker,

3

Willi Neubert, interview with the author, March 2011.

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standing in an attentive pose. Not even a mother is present with the small child, who is held by an older male child. The press, symbolic of the dissemination of the ideology, is the fulcrum on which these achievements turn. The narrative proposes a self-regulating system which is the product of socialist, human achievement. The breaking of the taboo of non-naturalistic composition in Die Presse emboldend Neubert to go further in his commission for a builders’ centre in Halle-Neustadt, Lebensbaum (Tree of Life) (Plate 6). This work uses a decentred composition with an array of poetic motifs which appear to invert the theme of ‘man’s mastery of nature’. This offers a feminine connotated counterpoint to Die Presse. The naked female figure, using a form and pose typical of the nudes of Henri Matisse, reads as the typical bourgeoise female nude. Marcia Brennan has argued that the female nude in Western Modernism offered a reassurance of the reproduction of the essentially masculine heterosexual viewing subject within the uncertainties brought by Modernist painting.4 In the context of socialist realism, the threat to the traditional gender order and femininity of women is explicit. Whether Neubert envisaged the soft, feminine forms, the bright, light colouring, and the references to nature as a counterpoint to the masculinity of the setting and lives of the construction workers or not, the female figure is clearly a departure from the typical tropes of the 1950s and 1960s, all of which prioritize female social roles over the corporeality of the woman.5 Neubert’s figure operates at a metaphorical level, and perhaps performs the ‘pleasurable, reassuring’ function suggested by Brennan, but might equally be seen as an

Plate 6 Willi Neubert, ‘Lebensbaum’ (Tree of Life), Halle-Neustadt, 1966. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013.

4

Marcia Brennan, Modernism’s Masculine Subjects (Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2006). J. R. Jenkins, ‘Tractor drivers, mothers and nudes’, 2018.

5

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inversion of the triumph of modernity suggested by Die Presse. Neubert’s figure does not exactly reproduce the conventions of ‘the nude’ in Western art; it offers a frontal pose, nonetheless slightly coy in its position, but the face of the figure appears to be thinking and looking outward, rather than inviting or introspective. The commedia dell’arte character – in this case the Picasso reference is clear – is anything other than rational or realist. Representing perhaps the fool, and at least the idea of masquerade, unreality and theatre, it could be read as the artist himself, or a comment on the whole project of ‘man’s mastery of nature’ through science and industry. For the avoidance of doubt, an environmentalist critique is present in the dying branch of the tree against the factory background, and notably the figure looks towards this part of the composition. Later in an interview, Neubert referred to the problems of pollution arising from industry, but these were not articulated publicly at the time he made the Lebensbaum.6 With its poetic motifs and soft colour, Lebensbaum is visually appealing and less obviously ideological than Die Presse, but it can be read as a critique on the very processes which are championed in Die Presse. Of the tropes of socialist realism, only the peace dove remains. Neubert developed the socialist realist content, but also the medium for painting. In later works, the Pressecafé in Berlin Alexanderplatz and another flanking the Stadthalle in Suhl (Plate 7), he discovered that pouring rather than painting industrial enamel solved the incredible technical obstacles of dealing with this material at 900-degree temperatures and took him to the possibilities of something flatter, poster-like, to almost abstraction, and further from conventions of socialist realist painting. Neubert was aware that he was entering difficult cultural political territory with this move away from realism. ‘I persuaded with my colour. They didn’t know this and found it persuasive. I said there was no other way of working using this technique, and then my work was supported.’7 Even in 1973 Neubert made this same case for colour, arguing that cheerfulness does not come from the laughing face, but that colour in itself was a form of idea and expression.8 The ‘poster-like’ qualities of the exterior work allowed for a completely non-natural composition, suspending rules of perspective and scale, allowing for a montage composition. These compositions, whilst not academically realistic, were not difficult to read. Like naive art, the graphic art of advertising or propaganda, or the Mexican murals, the use of symbols, visual references and non-linear narratives, present(ed) information decipherable by lay people.

6 Hans-Harm Leweke, ‘Ateliergespräch bei Prof Willi Neubert, Thale 19.02.77’, AdK-VBK-BV-Halle – 147. 7 Willi Neubert, interview with the author, March 2011. 8 Ullrich Kuhirt, Neubert, Maler und Werk (Dresden: VEB Verlag der Kunst, 1973).

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Neubert’s work was innovative not only in his material invention, but also in his ability to enfold some tension within the socialist realist repertoire.

Willi Sitte’s Kulturhalle painting Monumental painting enveloping interior space The sketches for a monumental mural by Willi Sitte, planned for the interior of the planned Kulturhalle (cultural centre) for Halle-Neustadt, demonstrate an increased confidence in – and tolerance of – ‘expressive’ form. Sitte proposed an ‘epochal’ painting demanding a sustained engagement on the part of the viewer rather than a simple story-like depiction. Most importantly, the design does not sit within an allocated rectangular space, but envelopes the entire interior architecture on two levels (Figures 5.1 and 5.2). In this respect it also follows Mexican muralismo treatments of architectural spaces. The interior location allowed for the expression of the painterly medium, but the architectural composition allowed the full effect of the projection of the work onto the outside space. The concept was the result of a successful cooperation between Sitte and the architect Joachim Bach, but as with several building projects towards the end of the Ulbricht era, the Kulturhalle was not built due to insufficient budgets and the prioritization of the new housing programme from 1971. Nevertheless, the concept of the monumental painterly mural, projected onto outside space through the glass of the building, was one which was later realized in representative cultural architecture, such as Sighard Gille’s monumental Song of Life in the Gewandhaus concert hall in Leipzig (1981). This potential for a retreat into the interior not only offered the chance for artist painters to create durable, monumental works with their familiar medium, but also reduced the sense of an imposition of less immediately readable art in the public domain. Whilst the projection onto exterior space as light and colour would contribute to the feeling of urbanity, the unmediated contemplation would take place within the context of the cultural surrounding. In this way the mural

Figure 5.1 Joachim Bach and Willi Sitte, Model for Cultural Centre in Halle-Neustadt, 1967. © Bach.

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Figure 5.2 Willi Sitte, ‘Freiheit der sozialistischen Persönlichkeit’ (Freedom of the Socialist Personality), Sketch, 1967. © DACS 2020.

belonged directly to the building and its function, rather than the facade acting as a canvas to announce ideas and information to the outside world. This idea did not replace other forms of monumental works, but it was a new solution which made a break with mosaics and other non-painterly methods. Placed within the cultural context, Sitte’s proposal for the Kulturhalle in Halle-Neustadt broke both formally and conceptually with a linear narrative – there are no comparable works in exterior spaces at this time.

Sigbert Fliegel’s conception for a dynamic programme of art and design An avant-gardist intervention: Understanding urban space as experience With the development of each of the first three living complexes in Halle-Neustadt, there had been ever greater exertions towards an integration of works of art and functional design within the architectural plan. The fourth living complex using tower blocks was intended as a radical departure, both in terms of architectural planning and in the plan for the visual arts. There was heightened analysis at this time of the potential economies to be made in higher-density building – more expensive to build, but offering long-term cost savings. For the first time, there was

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an attempt to match the pioneering spirit in architecture with a radical reconception for the art plan where not only the architecture but also the art and design would be optimized for ‘life processes’ within the public space.9 The architect of this new conception for the visual arts was Sigbert Fliegel, who had been working in the Halle-Neustadt planning bureau under Richard Paulick since 1966, and who was also responsible for Thälmannplatz in Halle, effectively the gateway to HalleNeustadt. For this space Fliegel and collective designed the monumental works Faust (Fist) and nearby Fahne (Flag, or Flame of the Revolution) in concrete. These concrete works, whilst Modernist in style, corresponded to the traditional idea of colossal scale and classical socialist motifs representing monumentality. But for Living Complex Four, Fliegel was interested in finding a way in which the art and design functions could be optimized as a total experience – a complex of politics and pleasure which would animate people to societal engagement through their experiences of public space. By analysing the spatial relations and perspectives in the living complex and the movements of people within and to and from them, Fliegel argued that the artistic content could be optimized for the right audiences, and thus form ‘a total conception of the emotional experiences which are a part of urban design’ (Figure 5.3).10 By carefully relating each work of art to the societal function of the building or space in which it would be placed, residents would be ‘inspire(d) [for] the participation in the forming of socialist life, and [become] enthusiastic about creative work in building of socialism’. The most radical element of Fliegel’s conception was Object 14. Using new projection technologies, images and film were to be projected onto ideally located architectural surfaces, based on Fliegel’s studies of the common routes through the area. There would be a ‘screenplay’, ‘according to the appropriate ideological aims’, with a long-term programme. The uses for this integrated cinematic experience could range from ‘advertising, political agitation, festival design, documentaries which would serve the formation of consciousness, aesthetic and musical education, cinema film’. In another location a ticker tape of text would be used for news and advertising. The effectiveness of these media would be particularly useful for shift workers coming and going in the hours of darkness. The use of film as a mass medium of political and cultural education was not new, but that it should be an art form within the residential complex was completely radical. The use of film acknowledged that there was an evolution of communications within the socialist society and challenged the unique authority of the artwork as carrier of artistic ideological meaning within public space. The proposed uses of the film medium between news, entertainment, advertising and fiction brought together the whole

9

The collective for the plan for Living Complex Four was led by architect Sigbert Fliegel and sculptor Kurt Grohmann. BArch DH2/PLAN 2854, 2–3. The idea was based on a dissertation which Fliegel was writing at the time but never completed (information from Fliegel to the author). 10 Ibid.

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Figure 5.3 Sigbert Fliegel research for sight lines within Living Complex Four, Halle-Neustadt. Drawing © J. R. Jenkins based on Sigbert Fliegel drawing.

span of means of forming ideological consciousness within the public space. It was effectively a form of permanent outdoor television. Fliegel described designers as the ‘trustees of society’ who, in their artistic achievements, were ‘determined by institutions and emotions’. Artists together with other creative thinkers, social scientists and psychologists should work together in the form of a collective in order to achieve a conception which took account of the life processes of people.11 The artistic conception should be ‘based on the ensemble and the total effect . . . individualistic behaviour in the realisation of singular artistic tasks should be avoided’. As he reflected on his ideas in 2012, Fliegel’s enthusiasm and conviction were not in the least diminished. He only regretted that ‘today there is no unified concept of what people should experience and feel’.12 His ideal for an artistic and design conception matched the ideal of the architecture as an authoritative and positivist manifestation of economic and societal functions; the optimization of the fulfilment of those functions required not works of painting and sculpture added to the architectural space, but the cooperation of artists and designers in the entire urban plan. In conversation, Fliegel described this process, not 11 Sigbert Fliegel, ‘Kunstkonzeption: Wohnkomplexe in Halle-Neustadt’, in Architektur und bildende Kunst im Bezirk Halle, 1969, 12. 12 Interview with the author, August 2012.

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intended as ‘indoctrination’, but a kind of ‘choreography’ as in the theatre, or analogous to the ‘editorial line’ in a newspaper.13 Fliegel was motivated by the idea of infusing the public spaces directly with a cultural and educational content to which residents could respond. This response was a means by which people would become co-designers rather than simply recipients of societal values. The conception presented by Fliegel and his collective was groundbreaking in several specific ways. Not only did it emphasize the ‘emotional experience’ of the urban space – a radical shift from the calculations on economy and functionality that preoccupied the planners – but it also took on the theme which the living complex had been assigned of ‘art, science and literature’ and proposed not a literal translation and visualization, but a metaphorical equivalence. Art and science were to be expressed through the coherence of ‘spirit’ or ‘intellect’ (Geist) and ‘power’ or ‘force’ (Macht), as a prerequisite of socialist cultural development,14 the interpretation of which was to be left to the creativity of the artist. Fliegel moved on from his post at Halle-Neustadt before he could nurture his conception to fruition. The reworked conception for Living Complex Four published in November 196915 took on board the ideas of bringing multiple aspects of design together, but there was no further mention of the open-air film projections or news ticker tape. This may have been due to the technological and organizational limitations of the coordinating committees, which were overburdened by the multiplicity of demands of Complex Environmental Design and struggled to keep up with ‘the necessary political ideological work with the artists’.16

Josep Renau’s panorama of murals for the Education Centre in Halle-Neustadt Innovation in creative method and the reconception of architecture The fourth example of innovation was the work of arguably the most radical artist in the GDR, the Spanish graphic artist Josep Renau (1907–82). Renau’s life and experience provide a compelling portrait of an émigré, able to create a niche within the larger political system which offered a refuge for political exiles, but outside the institutionalized art system which did not accommodate idiosyncrasies. Renau, who spoke very little German, created his own small art school in his house and atelier in Berlin and frequently gave lectures on his work, 13

Ibid. Fliegel, ‘Bildkunstlerische Konzeption WK IV’, 1967, 9. 15 ‘Zielstellung für die komplexe Umweltkonzeption des Wohnkomplexes IV’, LHASA, MER, P 516, IV/ B–2/9.02 /703. 16 Rosemarie Kuban, report to Culture Minister Klaus Gysi, 30.12.69, Berzirksleitung der SED, LHASA MER IV/B-2/9.02/704, 137–41, 141. 14

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but was not allowed to be a full member of the VBKD and did not participate in the art-political life or build up a network with East German artists. Renau’s experience tells us something about the power relations between contract givers, artists and architects, but also of a certain sovereignty of opinion outside the established art-political circles. Renau rejected the conventions of the easel painting, and employed the communication techniques of the graphic designer, the agitprop artist, the advertiser: juxtaposition, montage, symbol, metaphor, photograph, image and word. Renau had been a prominent artist in republican Spain before fleeing to Mexico in June 1934. He was artistic director at the Spanish Pavilion at the 1937 World Expo Fair, for which Picasso created his painting Guernica. Renau’s photomontages dominated and it is possible that Picasso sought to contrast Guernica as a work of art with Renau’s directly agit-prop photomontages.17 After the overthrow of the Republicans, Renau spent twenty years in Mexico in exile where he learnt mural painting with David Alfaro Siqueiros. With this exceptional political and artistic pedigree, Renau arrived in East Berlin in 1958 with a contract to publish a series of satirical montages (Fata Morgana). He was determined that his agitational graphic art and his experience of muralismo learnt over two decades in Mexico with Siqueiros could be put to the service of the communist cause. Renau’s understanding of realism demanded a decoding of images, symbols and metaphors in order to arrive at a political understanding of reality and thus stood in opposition to the idea of ‘reflection’. He believed that art should offer a stimulus to engagement and collective action within the contemporary reality, which he understood as the interdependence of Marxism and technological progress. But Renau was to be repeatedly disappointed in his attempts to bring his approach to public art in East Germany. Of his nine mural projects, only three came to fruition: in Halle (Plate 10),18 Halle-Neustadt and Erfurt.19 His first commission for architect Peter Flierl’s Rundfunkgebaude (Radio Building) in Berlin-Adlershof was rejected as ‘too Mexican’20 and replaced by a more conventionally realist work by Wolfgang Frankenstein (however, Renau realized this design later for the VEB Energy Building in Halle (Plate 10)). An interior for Ulbricht’s project, the Technology Centre in Berlin-Wuhlheide, fell victim to the uncertainties of the contract giver over the realist content. As new opportunities arose in Halle Neustadt, Renau identified as early as 1967 an ideal opportunity for a fully immersive mural in public space in the Bildungszentrum 17

Romy Golan, Muralnomad, 2009, 170. Josep Renau mural Die friedliche Nutzung der Atomenergie, (The Peaceful Use of Atomic Energy), VEB Energiekombinat Halle. Majolika painting on ceramic tiling. Execution by Lothar Scholz. 19 Renau’s commissioned but unrealized works were for the Rundfunkgebaude in Adlershof, the swimming pool in Halle-Neustadt, the Palast der Republik, the Porzellan Manufaktur in Meissen, the Technology Centre in Wuhlheide, and an unnamed work in Schwedt. 20 Eva-Maria Thiele, Josep Renau (Dresden: Verlag der Kunst, 1975), cited in Hermann Buchner, PhD Dissertation, ‘Die Entwicklung der Wandmalerei in der DDR’ (Berlin: Humboldt University, 13.09.1990), 86. 18

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Plate 10 Josep Renau, ‘Die friedliche Nutzung der Atomenergie’ (The Peaceful Use of Atomic Energy), Halle, 1971. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2011.

(Education Centre). Looking at the architectural plans, he envisaged a panorama of murals to span the five facades of the swimming pool, a research building or laboratorium (unrealized), the Mensa (student canteen) and the stairwells of the student halls of residence – roughly a kilometre and half stretch of land. Renau was preoccupied with the idea of how a citizen would experience these works as they traversed the territory. He proposed himself as the leader of a collective to do ‘all or none’21 of the works with the overall theme of ‘man and nature’, a proposal which was accepted in principle. Difficulties between the artists soon arose, as the composition of collective went through several changes – Nuria Quevedo, another Spanish exile artist with whom Renau especially hoped to work, and Doris Kahane left the collective, leaving Helmut Dix joined by Herbert Sandberg, René Graetz, Helmut Diehl and Dieter Rix. Graetz and Sandberg had actively promoted the collective mural along Mexican lines as a potential form of public art in the GDR in 1956, but were not interested in working under Renau’s direction. They proposed that each artist would develop their own design for each building facade, and succeeded in having a design for the pool, which showed the natural enjoyment of rather than Renau’s proposal to represent ‘rather than Renau’s proposal to represent “The geometry of man and nature”’,22 thus implicitly relating to the function of the building, accepted by the artistic council in Renau’s absence.23 As Flierl remarked in his postdoctoral dissertation of 1979, this demonstrated lack of

21 Renau, Josep, Presentation to the ZAG, ‘Synthese Architektur und bildende Kunst’, Halle, 26– 27 November 1970. BArch, DY 15/355, II/13. 22 proposed theme given in Sukrow, Arbeit. Wohnen. Computer, 2018, 165. Sukrow gives a detailed, illustrated account of the development of the panorama murals drawn from Renau’s archive in Valencia (IVAM). 23 Information supplied by Renau in a letter to Richard Paulick on 10 January 1969, giving his account of the sequence of events, as well as correspondence between the members of the collective, and between Joachim Bach, the architect, with the local SED leadership in Halle. LHA Sachsen-Anhalt, Merseburg, IV/B-2/9.02/703. These are held in the SED archives, and thus the highest political body in Halle was aware of the disputes. Whilst initially there was sympathy for Renau, no action was taken. Bellon also gives a full account of these events in which Renau’s daughter Teresa describes vividly the alcohol-fuelled meetings between the artists and the translator.

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Figure 5.4 Josep Renau, Foreground: ‘Der Marsch der Jugend in die Zukunft’ (The March of Youth Into the Future), student canteen. Background: student housing, HalleNeustadt, 1970. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Henrik Ahlers.

belief in the potential of the mural, using it in the habitual way to describe the function of a building rather than as a means of communication in its own right.24 Renau moved on to focus his energies on the truncated panorama which remained (Figure 5.4), and set about his research process with the assistance of his team of students at his gasworks atelier in Dimitroffstrasse in Berlin.25 This involved studying hundreds of photographs he took of the site and the buildings, in order to understand the spatial relationships between the buildings (Figures 5.5 and 5.6) (which had not been built at this stage) and the dynamic perspectives of the observer, information which he then reworked into his designs. He studied the effect of changing light conditions on the colours and made technical researches of the effects of the ceramic firing on the colours.26 After disagreements with the contract giver, just two of the original four works were realized according to Renau’s conception. Renau’s twin themes, which were to have been Der

24

Bruno Flierl, ‘Zur sozialistischen Architekturentwicklung’, 148. Within the Bitterfelder Weg principle it was expected that professional artists and writers would share their skills with amateurs in painting or literature circles. In Renau’s case he developed this into a small art school in Berlin. 26 The works were composed of 15x15 cm tiles at the industrial ceramic works in Boizenburg. Execution by Lothar Schulz. 25

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Figure 5.5 Josep Renau’s research for sight lines across a panorama of murals in Halle-Neustadt. Drawing © J. R. Jenkins based on Renau’s visualisations.

Mensch – Beherrscher der Natur (Man – Master of Nature) (Plates 12 and 11) and Ungebändiges Natur (Untamed Nature), were destroyed when he was compelled by the contract giver to abandon ‘untamed nature’ in favour of Die Einheit der Arbeiterklasse und die Gründung der DDR (The Unity of the Working Class and the Foundation of the GDR). Renau used the generic socialist icons of the handshake and the head of Karl Marx but gave them an equally dynamic treatment, with the energy of the handshake soaring up to the head of Marx as a universal life force.

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Figure 5.6 Josep Renau, student housing murals, Halle Neustadt. (see Fig 5.5.). © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Henrik Ahlers.

In 1970 Renau was invited by Bruno Flierl to address the Central Working Group of Art and Artists (ZAG).27 Here, Renau found an audience of high-profile players and was able to present to the expert public for the first time his understanding of muralism, which differed dramatically from what had previously been conceived.28 Renau’s impeccably socialist and thoroughly theoretically grounded account of his methodology, his relationship to realism, his perception of public space, his challenge to the primacy of architecture and his reference to difficulties with his contract giver (who at this time also attempted to withdraw the commission for the stairwells) touched every nerve imaginable amongst his audience of architects and artists. At length, Renau elaborated his views on particularities of the exterior mural: it has no frame, it has to relate to the urban environment, the buildings, the landscape, take account of changing perspectives, tempo, the light, reflection in water, in a way that an interior work does not. It has to be effective close up and from a distance. The mural artist must paint for everyone, not the art critics, nor for other painters, and not the Party; it must be for the ‘mass psychology’, and must use images and symbols that can be absorbed by the passer-by and stimulate engagement. He then described his method of ‘photographic selfcriticism’ to his audience, in understanding the multiple viewing perspectives which would inform his composition. He explained to the architects that it was 27

Bruno Flierl was co-leader of the ZAG between 1975 and 1983. BArch, DY 15/355, II/1-39.

28

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Plate 12 Josep Renau, ‘Die Beherrschung der Kräfte der Natur’ (Mastery of the Forces of Nature), Halle-Neustadt, 1974. Photograph © Martin Maleschka 2020.

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Plate 11 Detail of Josep Renau, ‘Die Beherrschung der Kräfte der Natur’.

necessary to round off the corner of the student canteen building so that the narrative would be continuous: the artist is not a slave to the architect – we need an integration of both, he told them. Renau’s account was met with ‘hearty applause’ but then silence from the conference delegates during the discussion. Whether this was due to discomfort at the sophistication of Renau’s understanding of muralism or his evident disregard for the anti-avant-gardism of cultural policy it is hard to tell. Joachim Näther, the chief architect of Berlin, was nonetheless impressed, claiming that there was no such level elsewhere of structural analysis of the urban space. For me, personally, it is incomprehensible and inexplicable that the path of Professor Renau has never crossed my own, or that of our architects in Berlin . . . I invite you warmly, respected Professor Renau, in the immediate future to bring about a meeting so that you can be involved in specific tasks in Berlin.29 Eventually, architect Reuschel spoke candidly: I think I know why we architects are saying nothing and hardly dare to give an opinion . . . In the GDR we have no experience in this area. Everything we have done so far, all these towns, are experiments . . . we are just experimenting, artists, architects, planners and contract givers . . . we need 29

BArch, DY 15/355, II/43.

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decades before we can do anything good . . . Professor Renau is the only artist living in the GDR who is a great communist and a great artist and who has worked on exterior murals for many years.30 Renau’s thematic concerns and iconography in his Halle-Neustadt designs, as well as in his other works, corresponded with the spirit of Ulbricht’s scientific and technological revolution. Die Beherrschung der Kräfte der Natur, represented by the muscular male torso at the controls not of the crane but of some kind of cybernetic machinery, replaced the crane worker and the manual labourer. In this respect, Renau did not present new ideas. However, his use of these symbols was not so much to ‘illustrate’ the scientific ideal, but to give them a metaphorical function, not immediately de-codable and integrated within a narrative montage.

A troubled relationship with the Mexican collective mural tradition Renau’s experience illustrates the ambivalent relationship between ambitions for GDR public art and the Mexican mural tradition. Many artists referred to this tradition and there were examples of Mexican-style works which passed the contract giver, such as Erich Enge’s 102-metre long mural (conf.) Sieg der Liebe über die Finsternis (Victory of Love over Darkness; 1976) in Erfurt-Rieth. Neubert recalled that when he raised the example of Mexican murals at a social occasion with Walter Ulbricht, he was quietly reminded by Ulbricht’s wife ‘not to push his luck’.31 But even the highest authorities acknowledged the international status of muralismo, even if this did not extend to an acceptance of such methods by East German artists. Ulbricht invited Renau’s former colleague, David Alfaro Siqueiros for an official visit to the GDR in 1970.32 To a packed hall at the Akademie der Künste in February 1970, Siqueiros related the history of muralismo, the inherent socialist nature of the genre, the mural method in terms of the dynamic reception and the need to research modern materials.33 Siqueiros took this opportunity to publicly acknowledge the contribution in Mexico of the much less well known Renau; Renau subsequently fashioned what had been a fractious experience of the mural collective into a historical account of disciplined communist collaboration.34 But this visit, it was Walter Womacka who was appointed to

30

BArch, DY 15/355, II/1-64-6. Willi Neubert, interview with the author, March 2011. 32 Walter Womacka, Farbe bekennen. Erinnerungen eines Malers (Berlin: Das Neue Berlin, 2004), 182. 33 David Alfaro Siqueiros, Manuscript of lecture on Mexican muralismo given at the Akademie der Künste on 17 February 1970, DDR Collections, Box 289 (Annelies Weidner papers), Folder 5. GRI, LA. 34 Jennifer Jolly ‘Art of the Collective: David Alfaro Siqueiros, Josep Renau and Their Collaboration at the Mexican Electricians’ Syndicate’, Oxford Art Journal, 2008, Vol. 31, No. 1 (2008), 131–151. 31

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travel to Mexico a few months later, where he discussed plans with Siqueiros to create a 300-metre mural on the theme of ‘International Solidarity’ near the monument to Spanish freedom fighters in the Park am Friedrichshain in Berlin. The Siqueiros–Womacka project did not come to fruition with the shift in priorities under the new first secretary Erich Honecker from 1973. However, Renau was invited to work on Honecker’s prestige project, the Palast der Republik in Berlin.35 In the first round of discussions in 1974, Renau, one of nineteen artists36 invited by minister of culture of the GDR, Hans-Joachim Hoffmann, arrived with sketches for a proposed a collective mural, or four 24-metre murals, using the method of Mexican revolutionary collective work, of which he would be the director and each artist would contribute according to their skills, as he had done for Siqueiros’s Electricians’ Union of Mexico. According to Renau’s account, only Ronald Paris defended him. Renau was outvoted by the other artists, who, unsurprisingly, preferred to each contribute their own authored painting. Most of the established artists of the VBKD had little enthusiasm for the collective mural. Perhaps they had little enthusiasm for Josep Renau. In the words of Flierl, Renau was ‘too communist for the GDR’.37 Renau was able to realize a final work in the GDR, Die Beziehung des Menschen zu Natur und Technik (The Relationship of People to Nature and Technology; 1981–3) thanks to the commitment of the architect Rosita Martsch in Erfurt. The ‘mastery of nature’ of the Halle-Neustadt murals transitioned in the ecological awakening of the era to, in Renau’s words a ‘hymn to nature’ – a similarly modified position towards modernity as that made by Neubert. It seems to be a fitting testimony that this work is one of the few GDR murals to be fully restored in the post-Wall era. However, a note by his biographer on the discussions of what to do with his legacy suggest that Renau himself may not have welcomed this late recognition in unified Germany: ‘Until that moment he had resisted being absorbed by the communist institutions; the prospect of becoming a fossil in Capitalism, object of exhibitions and the interest of museums, horrified him even more.’38

35

Accounts of these events collated by Bellon. The invited artists were Gerhard Bondzin, Günther Brendel, René Graetz, Erhard Großmann, Bernhard Heisig, Wolfgang Mattheuer, Arno Mohr, Karl Erich Müller, Willi Neubert, Ronald Paris, Josep Renau, Kurt Robbel, Horst Sagert, Wolfram Schubert, Willi Sitte, Günter Tiedeken, Werner Tübke, Hans Vent and Walter Womacka. Bondzin, Müller, Renau, Sager and Tiedeken were replaced by Matthias Wege and Lothar Zitzmann. 37 ‘Erinnerungen an Renau, Bruno Flierl’, Carmen Bärwaldt (dir.) Bezirksamt Marzahn–Hellersdorf, Berlin, Amt für Bildung und Kultur. Ich habe nicht gewartet. Ich habe gelebt. Der Maler und Fotomonteur, Josep Renau, 1907–1982. Documentation of exhibition at Ausstellungszentrum Pyramide, MarzahnHellersdorf, Berlin, March 2009 (Berlin: Bezirk Marzahn-Hellersdorf, 2009). 38 Fernando Bellón, La abrumadora responsabilidad del arte (València: Institució Alfons el Magnànim, 2008). Unpaginated copy made available by Bellón to the author. 36

PART THREE

From the Monumental to the Unreal (1973 to 1990)

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Chapter 6 A Space of Pure Possibility: The X. Weltfestspiele and its Impact on Public Art

If Ulbricht’s 1960s were dominated by the attempt to define a distinct socialist urbanism underscored by scientific and theoretical research, the 1970s and 1980s under his successor Erich Honecker were characterized by a much more relaxed idea as to what might constitute ‘socialist’ in cultural terms. The political foundation of the Honecker era (1971–89) was announced at the VIII Party Congress in 1971 as the Unity of Social and Economic Policy. The emphasis was on an improved consumer offer, family-oriented social policy and, above all, an ambitious house-building programme designed to provide modern homes for all by 1990. The ideological underpinning of socialist realism of the Ulbricht era gave way under Honecker’s leadership to a kind of polishing of the ideological surface whilst relinquishing the function of public art as a didactic tool. There was a subtle rhetorical and political shift from the abstract ‘joy in socialism’ to the ‘pleasures’ of socialism. This was manifest in thinking around designs of residential areas, as well as one particular event, the X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games), which took place in East Berlin in 1973. The event might not be considered immediately as a work of public art, but it had an important impact on conceptions of the societal significance of public space. Through application of the anthropological concept of liminality, we can also gain an understanding of the ongoing mythic status accorded to the nine days of this event and its longer-term impact. The Weltfestspiele was at one level an expression of monumentality, though in quite a different way to the idea of hero statues. The Weltfestspiele was also in some aspects analogous to Lenin’s 1918 Plan for Monumental Propaganda. Its impact was multifaceted: it paved the way for more participatory forms of public art and pointed to the potential of permanent environmental design and a new impetus towards creating functionally optimized and attractive residential spaces. Critically, it raised the expectations of a young generation born in the GDR and unburdened by direct experience of fascism. 157

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East Berlin had already hosted the Games in 1951 but the 1973 event took place in a very different political era, in what turned out to be just over half-time for the East German state. The end of the twenty-year period of CDU government in West Germany ushered in a period of rapprochement with the GDR through the Ostpolitik of Chancellor Willi Brandt from 1969. Both Germanys had accepted the existence of the other in the Basic Treaty in 1972 and were due to enter the United Nations later in 1973. These agreements fostered the confidence in the status of the GDR on the world stage, a political priority for Honecker. Moreover, the oil crises showed cracks in the capitalist system and the Vietnam War cast doubt over the moral authority of the United States. Internationally, left-wing movements sustained the confidence gained in the street protests of 1968, which developed into anti-authoritarian and alternative lifestyle movements and the onset of a new, informal youth festival culture. Erich Honecker had secured the right to host the festival from the Federation of World Youth in September 1971, allowing for a two-year phase of national mobilization and orientation in all fields of activity in the GDR. The festival was not staged for the GDR youth, but was to engage the entire GDR population for the international audience. The political leadership understood well the potential of the political historical moment and resolved, alongside the messages of international solidarity, peace and anti-imperialism, to promote the idea of world openness (Weltoffenheit). In the arts, Honecker’s 1971 declaration – ‘Taking into account the solid position of socialism, there can, in my opinion, be no taboos in the fields of art and literature’ – appeared to spell the end of the constraints of socialist realism, and the design of the festival was the first major event in which this apparent liberalism would be put to the test. The collective selected for creating the visual realizations was (as in 1951) drawn from the School of Art in Berlin Weissensee. For Walter Womacka, rector of the school from 1968 to 1988, this was to be one of his most ambitious projects. Like the graphic designer Klaus Wittkügel, he had previously attempted to find more graphic and temporary forms of art for public space. Womacka appointed a young, multidisciplinary artistic committee with a bias towards designers, including Axel Bertram, Rolf Walter and Lutz Brandt. Each headed a small team responsible for a different area of the design realization.1 This sense of the collective endeavour with a competitive edge, and indeed the sense of breaking the mould, was the success of the project. The extensive brief for the designs prepared by the Free German Youth (FDJ) proposed familiar themes of anti-imperialist struggle, solidarity with the Soviet Union, international peace and cooperation. Initially the committee were downcast at the brief, but soon realized the potential. Lutz Brandt emphasized the sense of empowerment felt by the designers commissioned to realize this immensely significant event: 1

Others included Heinrich Tessmer, Dietrich Kaufmann and Claus Werner.

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We were aware of our potential, we were the simply the best people in the GDR, in the Berlin region. We were arrogant, we wanted to plan the world. And we had an aim – to circumvent this whole . . . the whole level of cultural functionaries. They were always on our case, and we had an official contract, so they had to take us seriously. It was a mandate.2 For the festival emblem, the graphic designer Axel Bertram took the existing flower form of the World Youth Federation and adapted it by brightening the colours and pulling out the petals, as if bringing it into bloom. He also created visual puns with the X for tenth, and the W for X. Weltfestspiele, and with the counter of the B for Berlin and the form of the Television Tower at Alexanderplatz (Plates 24 and 25). This beacon of modern communications and technology, completed in 1969, was integrated into the identity of the Games. Bertram recalled his work on the designs and the realization with unqualified enthusiasm: ‘It was supposed to mean the world, the whole world.’3 The designs had to be approved by the contract giver, however – in the first instance, the FDJ, which was organizing the Games. Bertram’s designs were a radical departure from what had until that date been considered an acceptable visual universe for a public event representing the East German state. Figuration was entirely absent; the rainbow colour scheme could not be identified with socialism. None of the established visual codes or icons of socialist graphic

Plate 24 Axel Bertram, Designs for the X. Weltfestspiele X. World Festival Games, Berlin, 1973. © Estate Axel Bertram.

2

Lutz Brandt, interview with the author, Berlin, April 2011. Axel Bertram, interview with the author, Berlin, 6 August 2010.

3

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Plate 21 View of X. Weltfestspiele X. World Festival Games, posters, Berlin, 1973. © Fotoarchiv Rolf Walter.

agitation such as red flags, joyful marching, handshakes, Marx and Lenin heads were present. Photography, which in the graphic arts had become the preferred means of representing socialist reality in propaganda posters, was absent in the basic identity, although there were some photographic solutions in the posters realized later. The chosen house font was Paul Renner’s 1927 Futura, a classic typeface of Weimar Modernism. The identity norms guide resembled a display of abstract art. Walter recalled: Right up until the last minute we had a counter concept. We knew the whole thing could be cancelled. The Party representative from our working group who went to the presentation told us, ‘I’ve got everything in my case. If it gets rejected, then we can run the other one straight away.’4 Bertram explained how important it was to have the authority of Womacka on their side: As we began to show around the results of the designs, it became clear it was going to be really, really, difficult with the client. The best method of a designer, who dares to play the highest stakes, is to wait for the very last minute to finish . . . The Free German Youth committee were old men. They had imagined completely different . . . Womacka got it cleared. He wanted the 4

Rolf Walter, interview with the author, Berlin, March 2011.

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success for the school, of course a bit for himself too. He cleared it. Oh, how they squirmed, and no, no, no! It wasn’t committed enough for them.5 Lutz Brandt, too, emphasized the value of Womacka in convincing the Central Committee, of the radical ideas: Womacka always defended us. He valued us. There were things we designed and built, for example this big flag tower (Plate 23). Womacka thought it was great too. He took the model with him in meeting with the Central Committee. They would not let him in with the thing.6 The rainbow hues of the festival identity were unprecedented in the GDR landscape, but were completely in vogue internationally. East German designers were not isolated from such fashions: not only were there limited possibilities of organized visits to the West, and the reception of West German television, but the graphic trends from Britain, Europe and the Americas were accessible via magazines

Plate 25 Axel Bertram, Poster for the X. Weltfestspiele X. World Festival Games, Berlin, 1973. © Estate Axel Bertram. 5

Axel Bertram, interview with the author, Berlin, August 2010. Lutz Brandt, interview with the author, Berlin, April 2011.

6

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Plate 22 Flag tower, Berlin, 1973. Photograph © Fotoarchiv Rolf Walter.

Plate 23 Lutz Brandt, Design for a flag tower for the X. Weltfestspiele, X. World Festival Games, Berlin, 1973. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2011.

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such as Graphis and Novum, which were available in the art and design institutions in the GDR. In the early 1970s, colour printing and colour television were still novel in the West as well as the East, and the potential of these technical innovations was enthusiastically embraced by designers. ‘Technicolor’ was also to become the palette of peace activism, gay rights, hippy culture and alternative politics. These magazines also presented a specific precedent for a large-scale corporate identity which offered inspiration to the artistic collective, as Lutz Brandt accepted in interview with me. ‘Well, of course we were inspired by Munich. Of course, you could never say that. Not the designs, but we were inspired by the spirit, the feeling of joy and openness. We wanted to create that.’7 The chromatic range of the Munich Olympic Games identity was considerably more subdued than the rainbow colours of the X. Weltfestspiele. The lead designer, Otl Aicher, co-founder of the influential, Bauhaus-inspired Hochschule für Gestaltung in Ulm in West Germany, chose a palette of blue, grey and silver which was intended to represent the colours of the Bavarian landscape.8 Lutz Brandt expressed the sense of pride and competition with the Munich designers: Aicher was known to us of course, and we said, ‘yes that is it, that’s it . . . not exactly the same, but to think in these dimensions. But, of course without being allowed to say such a thing . . . Yes, of course we had pride. I mean we were completely the same standard as the designers over there. Which is always being disputed now . . . Many people were impressed with the West, had a belief in the West always thinking it was good there, and it was rubbish here, as is always waved in our faces today.9 Although Aicher’s concept clearly provided inspiration to Womacka’s collective, it was in fact much more restrained and controlled. The full rainbow spectrum and arch form was used only sparingly, to avoid any ‘embarrassing’ associations.10 The East German guidelines, in contrast, were not about the designer’s imposition of graphic discipline to ensure consistency. It was a fairly open concept which was to be taken up by mass organizations and citizens to create their own realizations. Ordinary people were encouraged to – and did – take them up, for example on balconies, in schools and shop windows.11 This was a socialist realist visual identity put into practice. 7

Lutz Brandt, interview with the author, Berlin, April 2011. ‘Das visuelle Erscheinungsbild für die Spiele der XX. Olympiade München, 1972’, Novum Gebrauchsgrafik, 7 July 1972. 9 Lutz Brandt, interview with the author, Berlin, April 2011. 10 Brigitte Beil, ‘The Graphic Image of the XX Olympic Games’, 1972, 151. It is not clear which potentially embarrassing associations she is referring to, whether this is an oblique association to the gay rights movement or just a general reference to alternative lifestyles. 11 ‘Leitlinie für die komplexe künstlerische Gestaltung der X. Weltfestspiele, 1973’, Sammlung Industrielle Gestaltung des Amtes für industrielle Formgestaltung der DDR, Berlin. 8

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The X. Weltfestspiele system borrowed many ideas for applications from the Munich Olympics system and, in a sense, the two events had a shared ambition. The task common to both was to permanently erase the stain left by Hitler’s 1936 Olympics. They needed to manifest the reinvention of each republic respectively, and appeal to an international audience; the visual signifiers of modernity were suited to that process for both Germanys. Modern design was one of West Germany’s key agents in its post-war reinvention as modern and democratic. The international appeal of this conglomerate of visual references, modern, youthful, counter-cultural or politically progressive, technologically advanced, was recognized in both cases. But in the East German assessments, the radical visual identity of the X. Weltfestspiele was re-anchored in the socialist narrative.12 The design was seen to reflect a common theme of anti-imperialist solidarity, peace and friendship.13 In his own analysis, Rolf Walter lifted the identity from the need to directly translate political ideas – an early indication of his ambitions to develop the success of the dynamic design forms of the Weltfestspiele for the longer-term environmental design. For Walter, the ‘lively, dynamic urban situation’ necessary for the satisfaction of the ‘socialist way of life’ and ‘people’s sensitivity to beauty’ needed to be met through all the areas of the arts, not simply the means of the temporary exhibition.14 In Munich too, designers reflected on these temporary spaces created by the Games which could become permanent feature ‘inspiring new initiatives of urban life’.15 The reconception of public space as a space of communication and pleasure for ordinary people became an explicit part of the character of both events. It is this aspect, the ‘staged openness’, in public space which has attracted the most attention in the post-1990 scholarship. The GDR authorities took a calculated risk in putting to the test a ‘no taboos’ ideal on the streets and squares of East Berlin. The preparation for mass performative liberty was one of prevention and covert management. Participants took part in ideological limbering-up sessions, in which the possible questions that participants might be asked by foreigners were rehearsed. These reiterated the polarity between the troubles of capitalism – US aggression, poverty, crime, drug addiction, homelessness – and the peaceable future under socialism. This conception of the poles of good and evil was quotidian, but for the first time young East Germans would have to defend in public otherwise taboo subjects such as the Berlin Wall and press

12 The event was featured in DA , BK , and in the journal of the DEWAG advertising agency, Neue Werbung four times in 1973. 13 ‘Das Festkleid der Hauptstadt– ein Ausdruck für den politischen Inhalt der X. Weltfestspiele’, Neue Werbung, 4, 07/1973, 2. The author of the piece is ‘M.B.’, not one of the members of the artistic committee or one of the editorial board of Neue Werbung. 14 Manfred Böttcher and Rolf Walter, ‘Die Stadtgestaltung – ein bedeutsamer Beitrag zum Erfolg der X. Weltfestspiele’, Neue Werbung, Issue 6, November 1973, 13–23. 15 ‘Das visuelle Erscheinungsbild für die Spiele’, Novum, 7 July 1972.

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censorship. On the other side of the Wall, Der Spiegel reported in the run-up with equally characteristic Cold War partiality, describing the festival as a ‘Sovietinspired monster show’.16 Whilst the participants in lively discussions in Alexanderplatz were partially monitored and even covertly managed by the state security service and the agitation task force, the experience of an open exchange of ideas was completely novel for East German youth. What the authorities did not seek to manipulate, however, were the more intimate and informal behaviours amongst the East German youth and the international delegates: dancing and music making, private conversations, and sexual relations (Figure 6.1). This tolerance undoubtedly contributed to the memorability of the event, as one participant described: In the city centre until eight in the morning you could drink, eat, without any hassle, without someone saying, ‘Time’s up, now’. People stood around at Alex discussing throughout the night. Not just young people but then also workers from the pub or from their shift . . . something like that had never happened before. The police were really like ‘your friend and helper’, just like in a children’s magazine.17 Covert security operations were internalized as a fact of East German life; self-control and self-censorship were normalized. Where participants commented on the astonishing freedom, they acknowledged the status quo of intolerance of certain kinds of public verbal and physical expression. The relaxed attitude of the authorities towards what would normally have been considered transgressive behaviour (hanging around, jumping in fountains, sleeping outdoors, sitting in groups playing music, having sex outdoors) delighted many of the eye witnesses, but as important were the undirected connections to people from other countries and cultures, music and dance, and languages – the taste of the ‘exotic’. The national struggles for liberation in Vietnam, Chile, Palestine, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and so-called ‘young national states’ were the contemporary incarnations of the anti-fascist narrative, and their heroes, with whom East Germans were encouraged to sympathize from childhood onwards, were suddenly a vibrant presence on the streets of East Berlin. The ‘foreign’, in the testimony of the cultural historian Ina Merkel, ‘had a euphoric effect on a youth, for whom political rituals became more and more meaningless’.18

16

‘Sowjet-inspirierte Monsterschau’, Der Spiegel, 23 July 1973. Ina Rossow. Interviews with participants at the X. Weltfestspiele collected by and held in Dokumentationszentrum Alltagskultur der DDR, Eisenhüttenstadt. 18 Ina Merkel, ‘Im Spiegel des Fremden: Die Weltfestspiele von 1973’, in Kulturation, Online Journal für Kultur, Wissenschaft und Politik, 2, 2003. www.kulturation.de/ki_1_thema.php?id=30 17

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Figure 6.1 Moment from the X. Weltfestspiele (X. World Festival Games) 1973. © Deutsche Fotothek / Norbert Vogel.

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We can explain the Weltfestspiele moment through the concept of liminality as defined by ethnologists Arnold Van Gennep and Victor Turner. This helps to understand to what extent the East German Games opened a space of possibility in terms of the visual representation of socialism and the participants’ experience of it. The Games have been described as ‘a propaganda show’,19 ‘window dressing’,20 ‘a beautiful illusion’,21 which masked the reality of state control and repression.22 But the suspension of normal life may have changed expectations in a way which was to resonate in years to come. Furthermore, the visual design of public spaces may have had an impact on the way in which the city was understood as a space for non-sanctioned behaviours. The concept of the ‘liminal phase’ represents the crossing of a threshold into indeterminate social space, a transitional period, free from the constraints of normative behaviours. In Turner’s description, the condition of liminality generates a sense of communitas, or commonness of feeling, and in many senses this was evident in the forms of spontaneous sociability and heightened emotional experience at the Games. At the same time, the communitas of group belonging was a familiar condition in everyday life for East German youth, so this was nothing new.23 However, eye-witness testimonies suggest that it was not so much the sense of togetherness amongst the East Germans, but the taking of small liberties made possible by the sense of common purpose which made the experience of the Games exceptional. The participants thus experienced the communitas familiar from socialist life, but also redefined it on their own terms. The ‘realm of pure possibility’ also gave rise to incidents of ‘status reversal’ – another possibility described by Turner. This was specifically alluded to by Lutz Brandt as he recalled how they were able to invert the relationship between designer and political bureaucrats. The designers felt that they were empowered to make the radical designs, rather than the old men leading the FDJ; they spoke as though they had manipulated the situation to push through their ideas. Brandt

19

Ulrich Mählert and Stephan Gerd-Rüdiger, Blaue Hemden – Rote Fahnen Die Geschichte der Freien Deutschen Jugend (Wiesbaden: Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Springer, 1996). 20 Marc Dietrich Ohse, Jugend nach dem Mauerbau: Anpassung, Protest und Eigensinn (DDR 1961– 1974) (Berlin: Links, 2003), 353. 21 Stefan Wolle, Die Heile Welt der Diktatur. Alltag und Herrschaft in der DDR 1971–1989 (Berlin: Links, 1998). 22 A notable exception to this general consensus is Ina Merkel’s reading, which looks at the role of the foreign and exotic for young East Germans at the festival. Ina Rossow’s research is also more differentiated. 23 As von Saldern suggests, this represents ‘A community built not on discursive consensus but through collective meaning, ritual and negotiation. Control is not based simply on repression, but also on the symbolic and material offer, which must at least partly orientate itself to those addressed.’ Adelheid von Saldern, Inszenierte Einigkeit, 2003.

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also recalled in his interview the empowerment of the designers as they moved around the city during the Games: You know we had real fun! You know we had to get around so fast, that we had to get around quickly, and we painted our own identity cards and stuck them on the cars! . . . All the cops were speechless. Such things gave us such a great time.24 If the designers and participants felt powerful, the powerful – from the police to the most powerful person in the country – also became ordinary in a way which neatly corresponds to Turner’s description of status reversal during the liminal phase.25 The function of this, he suggests, maybe a kind of ‘release’ from the incumbency of higher office, but serves to reinforce the existing structure. This principle is illustrated by a photograph taken during the Games in which Honecker converses with guest of honour, the activist Angela Davis, in central Berlin. The reversal could not be more complete. She had iconic status at the festival: rather than a dead white man, the communist hero is a living black American woman. Honecker has a casual demeanour in the unusual night-time setting and is surrounded the detritus of takeaway food. Honecker himself wrote in his autobiography of how he allowed himself to lose control when he joined the crowds on Alexanderplatz: Instantly there was a throng of young people around us. We were warmheartedly drawn into the colourful events and into discussions. Jokes were exchanged, songs were sung. We could hardly influence the way we were going.26 The liminal phase is also defined by its closure since, by definition, it is a transitional state. Even without the formal ending of the Games and the departure of the foreigners, a poignant and opportune event provided the ideal condition for the stripping of the city’s party clothes and ritualistic reassertion of state authority: Walter Ulbricht passed away on the third day of the event and after the closing ceremony and clearing of the streets, the state funeral procession took place through the same central spaces, and East German citizens lined the streets of Berlin in the manner typical of such formal state occasions. Following eight days of clear blue skies and bright sunshine, it even began to rain.

24

Lutz Brandt, interview with the author, Berlin, April 2011. Victor Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (New York: Cornell, 1969), 166–203. 26 Erich Honecker, Aus meinem Leben, Biografie (Berlin: Dietz, 1980), 333. 25

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The success of the SED leadership lay not simply in its security and management of the event, but in the understanding of how to appeal to the generation born after the building of the Wall whilst reaffirming socialist values and fostering the sense of collective engagement under the banner of Solidarity, Friendship and Peace. Many of the foreign delegations were engaged in a struggle for socialism: East Germans had it for real. Socialism was once more associated with ‘the pathos of the revolution’.27 Accustomed to being poor relations of the more prosperous West, many young East Germans felt a new self-confidence in their own lives.28

Evaluation of the X. Weltfestspiele For the temporary event at least, the avant-gardist ideal of painting the city and animating the citizens to political dialogue and social communication was without question effective. The participants generated, albeit in a temporary and heightened way, exactly the kind of urbanity which city planners knew could not be achieved through architecture or the situation of works of art and applied arts in public spaces. If this was a form avant-gardist ‘life merging with art’, it coincided with a period of renewed interest and acceptance of the avant-garde and the Leninist period more generally. The Weltfestspiele experience was a test for Honecker’s declaration of ‘no taboos’ in the arts. Although often only the second part of his statement is quoted (‘there can, in my opinion, be no taboos in the fields of art and literature’) the first part (‘Taking into account the solid position of socialism . . .’) is the key to its significance. Socialism was sufficiently embedded to allow a reconfiguration of its familiar signifiers. This was a radical change towards a postmodernist understanding in which meanings were no longer fixed to given representations. The cause-and-effect relationship of socialist imagery and social consciousness which had governed ideas around cultural policy was reevaluated. Honecker’s statement in itself relinquished the idea of a ‘true’ visual manifestation of socialism. Whilst the narrative of world openness is the one most frequently criticized in the X. Weltfestspiele scholarship, the value of openness was present in several ways. It was present in the experience of solidarity and internationalism at street level which left a long-term impression on participants in spite of the surveillance. Openness was also part of the designers’ concept, which was not about the

27

Merkel, ‘Im Spiegel des Fremden’, 2003. Ohse, Jugend nach dem Mauerbau, 354; Karen Henderson, ‘The Search for Ideological Conformity: Sociological Research on Youth in the GDR under Honecker’, German History, Vol. 10, No. 3, 1992; Jeanette Madarasz, Conflict and Compromise in East Germany (Basingstoke: Palgrave 2003). 28

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exactness and control of their graphic design creations, which were freely interpreted by many designers and laypeople. The identity reflected the ‘spirit’ of the Games, in other words, the feelings and associations that were generated. Reflecting on the 1968 Mexico Olympic designs, lead designer Eduardo Terrazas has spoken of those designers’ intentions in exactly the same way. The design of the Games was not about the graphics, but was ‘an opportunity to make a political and cultural statement’, internally and externally, to prove Mexico’s worth as a ‘third world’ country, and also to demonstrate the importance of connecting with the people in a socially responsible way.29 The East Berlin event and its design also proved to be a catalyst for a freer interpretation of the role of art in public space. Under the Honecker administration, the search for the aesthetic specificity of socialist art and architecture was gradually relinquished. Similarly, interest waned in the development of theoretical models and terms such as ‘socialist personality’, ‘socialist way of life’ and ‘socialist life processes’ intended to fuse socialism as a form of economic production and distribution with a socialist culture ideal. The rebranding of East German socialism at the X. Weltfestspiele, in its appeal to an international audience, as youthful, modern and open to dialogue can be understood as at least a projected confidence in the embeddedness of the socialist ideal. The limitations on the palette of symbols that were associated with the affirmations of socialist difference was no longer necessary. A plausible counterargument would be that that this was a tacit acknowledgement of public fatigue with socialism and its symbols. This would be an argument concerning the intentions behind the relaxation of cultural policy, but would not alter the case that the image and narrative around the culture of socialism that was projected indicated not a falsity, but a reconfiguration of the cultural expression of socialism. The post-Weltfestspiele phase has largely been described as the thud of the dull reality of the GDR and feelings of disappointment, even bitterness, for those euphorized youth that there was in fact to be no liberalization once the eyes of the world had turned away from the GDR. There was ‘shock at the subsequent closure’.30 In Turner’s model, this phase would be called aggregation or postliminal, ‘when the ritual subject enters a new stable state with its own rights and obligations’.31 This means that whilst order is re-established, there is a new state. There is not an exact return to the pre-liminal phase, and this is undoubtedly true of the X. Weltfestspiele, even if the official conclusions insisted that ‘What

29

Eduardo Terrazas, Carolina Rivas and Daoud Sarhandi, ‘This is 1968 . . . This is Mexico’, eye, Summer 2005. 30 Merkel, Im Spiegel des Fremden’, 2003. 31 Victor Turner, ‘Betwixt-and-Between: The Liminal Period in Rites de Passage’, in The Forest of Symbols: Aspects of Ndembu Ritual (Icatha: Cornell, 1967), 93–111, 94.

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happened there was no phenomenon. Nothing about it was incomprehensible.’32 The event could not be marked as ‘exceptional’ since the whole point had been to demonstrate life ‘as it was’ under socialism. Perhaps there was already a wariness that these identity-forming experiences may raise the expectations of a generation. The official assessments of the X. Weltfestspiele did not acknowledge any kind of exceptionalism of the event. It was framed as having proven the success of socialism to the outside world. Rather than acknowledging the importance of meeting the needs of a new generation of young people, it was argued that FDJ youth should demonstrate ‘greater penetration of pride in the socialist fatherland’, ‘more offensive discussion with bourgeois ideology’, ‘deepening of class consciousness’ and so on.33 A declaration which was to be the basis of the Youth Law in 1974 did offer a few ‘concessions’ to youth34 in exchange for their ever greater commitment to socialism, but it was effectively a re-norming of the prescribed order where the youth were to take their lead from the authorities. This moment of liberalization and closure is generally marked out in scholarship through key events – for example, the above-mentioned Youth Law of 1974, the expulsion from the GDR of the singer-songwriter Wolf Biermann in 1974, the banning of the rock group the Klaus Renft Combo in 1975. But these markers are unable to tell us much about how the X. Weltfestspiele may have worked on the expectations of the GDR youth, particularly the FDJ delegates. Ina Merkel, as one of those who experienced the ‘pathos of the revolution’ and subsequent ‘depatholigization’ (entpathologisierung) or ‘de-eroticization’, points out that the X. Weltfestspiele generation were the ones who turned their backs on the GDR in 1989.35 Whilst she is not making a causal link, the point is that a new generation had raised expectations. These were not those who saw socialism as an answer to Hitler fascism, but for whom socialism had to measure up to its promises. Turner’s ‘realm of pure possibility’ had to find an outlet – whether in attempts to recreate aspects of the experience by using it as leverage with the authorities, or in feelings of frustration or rejection of the GDR.36 Thus, normality was not restored, but a new state was established ‘with its own rights and obligations’.

32 Gisela Steineckert and Joachim Walther, Neun-Tage-Buch. Die X. Weltfestspiele in Berlin. Erlebnisse, Berichte, Dokumente (Neues Leben: Berlin, 1974), inside cover text. 33 ‘Weitere Schlußfolgerungen aus der Durchführung der X. Weltfestspiele der Jugend und Studenten’, Politbüro Resolution, 09.101973. BArch DY/20/JIV 2/2 1471. 79–83. 34 For example, ‘more artistic works about the youth’, freeing up of budget for the all-year-round availability of the Pioneer Park Ernst Thälmann. 35 Ina Merkel, ‘Hinterher war alles beim Alten’. Interview, Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung, 2013. http://www.bpb.de/mediathek/380/hinterher-war-alles-beim-alten 36 Lutz Brandt unexpectedly found an opportunity to leave the GDR in 1984, of which he took advantage.

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The X. Weltfestspiele became a reference point which could be drawn on to make demands for change in its short- and medium-term aftermath. The artists and designers involved sought to use their sense of empowerment to maintain the momentum of this space of possibility. Walter Womacka invoked the interdisciplinary working method as an argument for restructuring his Institut für Baugebundene Kunst (Institute for Building Related Art) in Monbijoupark in Berlin, ‘to bring together different artistic disciplines for the socialist environment’.37 The X. Weltfestspiele was to offer a model for the realization of the idea of Complex Environmental Design, not simply as interdisciplinary planning, but as a form of communication which should become part of the way of life. This point was taken up by the sociologist Fred Staufenbiel, who wrote in support of Walter’s initiative: ‘It is not just about synthesis but about complex design as part of the way of life in the urban environment . . . The work of the designer collective for the X. Weltfestspiele was unique in this respect.’38 For Bruno Flierl too, the Games served to reiterate his argument that the urban and residential space is essentially a social environment, supported by the environmental design. It was not the decoration or furnishing of the city that gave it life, but the people who were visually in action through their demonstrations and meetings, in singing, dancing and games.39 The industrial designer Heinz Hirdina described the Weltfestspiele as ‘the first complex urban design which was actually realized’.40 What was important from the industrial and graphic designer’s perspective was the way in which design could improve the experience of public space through better communication and secondary architecture which would encourage people to spend time there.

The influence of the X. Weltfestspiele on the artistic concept for Marzahn The X. Weltfestspiele as a social-aesthetic event explicitly informed Rolf Walter’s next major project as the artistic director of the ambitious new development north-east of Berlin in Marzahn. With the construction of over sixty thousand apartments and all associated social facilities between 1977 and 1989, Marzahn was one of the largest housing areas in Europe and represented the greatest test

37 Correspondence with Hans Joachim Hoffmann, Minister for Culture, 01.10.1973, LArch, Berlin, C Rep. 711 Nr. 181, 1971–1975. 38 Fred Staufenbiel, ‘Statement: Leiter des Arbeitskreises’, February 1974. 39 Bruno Flierl, ‘Komplex geplant, gesellschaftlich genutzt’, form+zweck, 52. 40 Heinz Hirdina, Gestalten für die Serie: Design in der DDR 1949-1985 (Dresden: Verlag der Kunst, 1988), 239.

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for the next generation of housing following Halle-Neustadt. Marzahn as Complex Environmental Design within ‘Complex Urbanism’ represented a new era in industrialized building, which attempted to address some of the criticism of 1960s and Modernist urbanism more generally by creating more sense of community, or ‘milieu’. Marzahn was decisively not a set of ‘overspill’ housing estates, but should be independently functional as well as being connected to the main city of Berlin – and in this respect continued the socialist realist ideals of the Sixteen Principles of Urbanism set out in 1950.41 For Rolf Walter, the prestigious appointment to head the environmental design collective gave him the chance to realize ideas he had developed in his dissertation from 1973. He proposed three levels of visual design in the city, in which 1) existing natural and technical conditions, 2) the applied arts such as crafts, visual communication and form design, and 3) the fine arts in the form of tableaux and sculptures should play a role in the social and aesthetic functionality of public space.42 Walter’s scheme was indebted to Flierl’s ideas for Complex Environmental Design as a cultural process which in the socialist society ‘is determined by the mode of production, the socialist way of life and the politicalideological superstructure in relation to the base’.43 Thus the definition of the socialist environment as socialist, through the ‘way of life’, as proposed by Flierl, was taken up by Walter, but with more emphasis on how this should work through the different art forms and their respective functions. Complex Environmental Design was understood by Flierl and adopted by Walter not as interdisciplinarity per se, but the ‘planned environmental design in accordance with whole societal demands’. This was not, Walter argued, ‘about the total aesthetic design down to every last detail . . . the city grows and has life.’ By 1975, all the major decision-making bodies and discussion forums of architecture and art had accepted the idea of Complex Environmental Design, even if there were differences in understanding, as the basis for the future development of the built environment.44 Thus Walter could be confident in his

41 For an in-depth discussion of the ideological-intellectual basis for the ‘Complex’ response to the perceived failings of Modernist planning, see Lange, ‘Komplexe Umweltgestaltung’, 2016; in relation to the Sixteen Principles: 113. 42 Rolf Walter, Dissertation ‘Zu Problemen visueller Kommunikation in der Stadt’, Kunsthochschule Weissensee, Berlin, 1973. Supervisors: Prof Klaus Wittkugel, Prof Fred Staufenbiel, Dr Harald Olbricht. 43 Ibid. 44 In 1975 the Ministry for Building and Culture organized a consultation on the question of Complex Environmental Design. It was also recognized at the sixth building conference of the ZK of the SED in 1975, and the seventh congress of the BdA in 1975. The seventh congress of the VBKD also focused on Complex Environmental Design; and at the VBKD Präsidiumssitzungen, a working group including Flierl and Meuche, the Artists’ Union also produced a statement on Complex Environmental Design in preparation for the building conference. VBK Zentralvorstand, Präsidiumssitzungen, 1975–1976, AdK, VBK Zentralvorstand – 2.

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approach, which used the model of the interdisciplinary working group of painters, sculptors, designers, form designers and art critics as for the X. Weltfestspiele.45 At the seventh ZAG seminar in Dresden in 1974, Walter elaborated his artistic conception for Marzahn.46 The seminar, dominated by Flierl, was the first conference to re-examine the question of housing since the new welfare and housing-orientated political course set out by Honecker at the VIII Party Congress in June 1971. At the seminar, a consensus was established that socialist ways of living and thinking did not stand in a cause-and-effect relationship with the socialist narrative artwork situated within the built environment. Walter’s artistic concept for Marzahn did not reduce the public art to what Flierl had termed Beglückungsideologie47 (the ideology of just keeping people happy), but expressed the need to find a unity between aesthetic, functional and social requirements, with the ideological demands explicitly secondary. However, even at this stage, Flierl felt that Complex Environmental Design was being misunderstood as a process of integrated design activities towards a completed end result, rather than primarily a process of ‘communalization’ (Vergesellschaftlichung), the basis of which in the first instance was architecture.48 This was why the X. Weltfestspiele, improbable though it might seem given the exceptional nature and brevity of the event, was held in such high esteem as an example of ‘communalization’ due to the creation of a space for organic social development. Walter’s plan for the careful development of the three levels was difficult to effect in practice because of the many structural, economic and organizational difficulties. Whilst he insisted that Complex Environmental Design ‘did not aim for perfectionism’ and was not ‘a total city aesthetic, or the city as a work of art’,49 the reality of production made this inconceivable. In interview with me, Walter referred to the problems of ‘turbulence and debts in the building business’, which made the actual realization of ideas for a variety of living blocks, for more functional elements as part of the urban plan, very difficult.50 What Marzahn did

45 Members of the collective: Horst Göhler, Peter Hoppe, Heinrich Tessemer, Lutz Brandt, Karl Blümel, Ingeborg Hunzinger, Gunter Wächtler, Wolfgang Weber, Kurt-Heinz Rudolf and Rolf Walter (Goldberg et al., Kunst in der Großsiedlung: Kunstwerke im öffentlichen Raum in Marzahn und Hellersdorf: Eine Dokumentation (Berlin: Bezirksamt von Marzahn-Hellersdorf, 2008)). 46 Rolf Walter, ‘Probleme der Ausarbeitung von Konzeptionen für die komplexe Umweltgestaltung in großstädtischen Bereichen’, ZAG seminar, 14–15 November 1974, Box 169, Folder 8, VBK/ZAG Architektur und bildende Kunst, 1976, DDR Collections, GRI, LA. 47 Flierl used the term in the seventh ZAG seminar, ‘Gestaltete Wohnuumwelt. 7. Seminar der Zentralen Arbeitsgruppe Architektur und Bildende Kunst des BdA/DDR und des VBK/DDR am 14. und 15. November 1974 in Dresden’. DDR Collections 940002, Box 169, Folder 8, GRI, LA. 48 Bruno Flierl, ‘Komplex geplant, gesellschaftlich genutzt’, form+zweck, 7, 1975. 49 Rolf Walter, ‘Berlin Marzahn: Anliegen und Nötwendigkeit komplexe Stadtgestaltung’, Architektur der DDR , 10/83, 600–4. 50 Rolf Walter, interview with the author, Berlin, November 2011.

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achieve, however, was the acceptance of the mural, monumental in scale, which did not have to subordinate itself to the architecture. The sides of housing blocks acted as gigantic canvases for new, popular, fantastical and even abstract expressions. Humorous, surreal and trompe l’oeil murals – non-ideological murals – which were also in vogue in West Berlin and elsewhere as a light-hearted way to brighten up otherwise triste urban surfaces became acceptable within the parameters of GDR environmental design, beyond Marzahn. According to Lutz Brandt, works such as his trompe l’oeil on the highly frequented Warschauer Strasse (Figure 6.2) in Berlin made the authorities nervous (‘They were suspicious if they didn’t know what it was about . . .’),51 but they offered new landmarks and points of identification in the city which left behind the socialist realist stereotypes. The graphic design section of the VBK-DDR in Leipzig launched the first of the Giebel Wettbewerben52 (gable wall mural competitions) in 1979, an idea that was followed in Berlin. These competitions were pursued by graphic designers in particular, which may have helped the de-ideologization of the works: conceptualized as within the pre-war Leipzig tradition of large-scale painted advertising, these could fall more within the category of Gebrauchsgrafik (commercial art) than art, and were, in the report of the organizers, hugely popular amongst the public.53 The liberty afforded by such de-ideologization was, however, offset by the fact that it was difficult to fit the works within a legislative and funding structure. This more open concept of art in public space was taken up by Wolfgang Kil, editor of Farbe und Raum from 1975 to 1983. Inspired by tectonically dissonant murals in Koszalin, Poland, photographed by Klaus Johne in 1978, Kil used the trade publication to advance a debate on the purpose of urban art, arguing for the possibility of experiment and the chance to make mistakes – in other words, the freedom not to plan and design. Kil was a student of Flierl, and one of the next generation of practitioners and critics who wanted to stimulate a debate about new understandings of art in architecture. ‘There is pleasure in playful abstraction, and bright colours, in using irony in a pleasing way. There is no relationship to the architecture. It has its effect with people.’54 Nonetheless Kil’s arguments and examples provoked a furious response from some of his readership, for whom the examples ‘[broke] the basic rules of decorative design on buildings and [tore] apart the organically grown form of the house fronts, [and were evidence of] the demolition of the architectural form’.55 In response, Kil

51

Lutz Brandt, interview with the author, Berlin, April 2011. Bernd Sikora, ‘Ein Wettbewerb und seine Probleme’, Farbe und Raum, 4/79. 53 Bernd Sikora, ZAG Seminar, ‘Farbe in der Stadt’, 15–16 November 1979, Gera. BArch, Berlin 15/563, 33. 54 Wolfgang Kil, ‘Bemalte Giebel in Koszalin, VR Poland’, Farbe und Raum, 5/78. 55 G. Zeugner, Letter to the Editor, Farbe und Raum, 9/78. 52

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Figure 6.2 Lutz Brandt, Mural, ‘Reflexionen’ (Reflections), Berlin, 1979. © Lutz Brandt.

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argued for a ‘relaxed engagement with the environment, fresh and uncomplicated, which should be equal to the seriousness with which we occupy ourselves where appropriate’. One contribution argued that ‘more important than a place in the lexicon of the building history, should be the happy smile of the residents’.56 Whilst ‘happy smiles’ sounded rather banal when compared to the ambitions for the socialist environment set out by the theoretical contributions of the ZAG meetings, ‘the happiness of the people’ had since the VIII Party Congress been established within official rhetoric as the highest political aim.57 If ‘pleasure’ in the environment was to be invoked as an aim of socialist design, then it had a different quality to the concept of Lebensfreude, or joy in life, which represented, as David Crowley and Susan Reid have put it, ‘a kind of abstracted, disembodied higher goal’,58 which demanded self-denial in the present with the promise of a better future. At the same time, the pleasure that may have been invoked by the new visual languages was not conceived of as a subjective, niche experience, or a relief from the pressures of everyday life, but as much a collective experience as the more abstract concept of ‘joy’. Pleasure in this context did not refer either to an unspoken contract of the concessions to materialist desires in exchange for political loyalty.59 The engendering of pleasure, for which Frank Ehrlich had argued back in 1959, was to become an explicit aim of the design of the socialist environment. Beauty, too, remained in place as a central aim of the formation of the built environment, but also in the sense of a more pedestrian experience of the surroundings. Summing up a discussion on life in the immediate areas around housing blocks and on the roofs in Magdeburg-Neustadt at the Dresden seminar in 1974, Achim Felz remarked: I think, it is exactly the simple and also the small things which are particularly important in what we see as the designed environment – because these are the things which make life in the immediate residential area interesting and beautiful.60

56

Kurt Schönburg, Studienrat, Letter to the Editor, Farbe und Raum, 11/78. Honecker declared ‘the happiness of the people’ to be highest aim of the ‘unity of economic and social policy’ when he took office in 1971. 58 David Crowley and Susan E. Reid, Pleasures in Socialism, 2010. 59 This kind of contractual relationship is also invoked in a study of pleasure in Germany’s Third Reich: ‘Pleasure . . . promised far greater returns . . . than outright repression or indoctrination ever could’, Pamela E Swett, Corey Ross and Fabrice d’Almeida (eds), Pleasure and Power in Nazi Germany (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan: 2011), 3. 60 Achim Felz, ‘Komplexe Umweltgestaltung Magdeburg Neue-Neustadt’, Gestaltete Wohnumwelt, 7. Seminar der Zentralen Arbeitsgruppe Architektur und Bildende Kunst des BdA/DDR und des VBK/ DDR am 14. und 15. November 1974 in Dresden (Berlin: BdA/DDR, VBK-DDR, 1974), 15. 57

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Pleasure in the art and design of the built environment and the subsequent experience of happiness invoked by commentators at this time can be seen as analogous to the emotions triggered by the X. Weltfestspiele. The positive experiences at this event were not derived simply as an apolitical by-product of the main programme, although it is clear from the accounts that collective and deviant pleasure contributed to the condition of liminality. Part of the pleasure was derived from the sense of validation of socialism through the connections with foreigners who aspired to the same political future. The artistic plans conceived to invoke a pleasurable sense of identification were intended to marry this with the socialist ideal and build on an idea of collective experience which could be justified also in Marxist terms. In 1972, the prominent art critic Peter Feist identified this as a change in art as it moved into the 1970s: There is a space opening in fine art, in the decorative (wrongly maligned) as well as in the ornamental . . . and the intellectual solution . . . Even the most serious, ideologically ambitious and focused art must have something to do with entertainment in the best socialist sense, with the pleasure of the viewer in their connection with the art, must have something to do with the generation of his ability to enjoy.61 Feist gave the Marxist justification for the validity of pleasure in terms of the surplus time created by increased productivity which allowed for the full ‘development of the individual’, and further that the ability to experience pleasure was seen as a mark of the cultural resources of the individual. There was no refusal of pleasure in Marxism, but in fact the development of productivity was also the means of pleasure.62 The X. Weltfestspiele functioned as a clear marker of a change in what could be characterized as socialist beyond the established ideological values. This was the beginning of an era where the content and expression of the art in public space became much more novel and in which there was a release from the preoccupation of the unity of art and architecture as the correct course for art in public space.

61

Peter H. Feist, ‘Der Mensch und sein Werk’, Dezennium 2 (Dresden: Verlag der Kunst, 1972), 37–8. Feist cites Marx’s Grundrisse der Kritik der Politischen Ökonomie, 1 857–8: ‘There is no denial of pleasure, but the development of power, of the ability to produce, and thus also the capacity for and the means of pleasure.’

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Chapter 7 ‘Ultimately, Ordinary People Want to Have a Bit of Kitsch’: How Socialist Realism Looked Unreal Housing construction in the GDR was like an enormous warship, and to change its course you need ten sea miles. And we artists danced below, on the upper deck and the captain looked down at the artists and says, ‘Aren’t they great?’ But we did not really have much chance to influence the direction. Maybe we just made the captain feel older.1 This assessment by the muralist Lutz Brandt, one of the artists from both the Welfestspiele and Marzahn housing project, encapsulates a sense of unreality which took hold in the last years of the GDR. The late 1970s and 1980s were characterized by a decline in rhetorical works of art in public space, and at the same time attempts to reinvent localized historicism. Just as the very Modernist project of state socialism began to crumble from within, so the art and design of East Germany’s cities drew from the historical, the unreal, the banal, the humorous and the abstract – developments which might be collectively described as socialist unrealism. A work by Ludwig Engelhardt (who also created an ‘ordinary’ Marx and Engels figuration in the Berlin Lustgarten ensemble in the early 1980s which circumvents the monumental heroic idiom) is on the cusp of this delicate balance between the real and unreal and hints at the hyperreal. The bronze figures of two collective farmers LPG-Bauern (Figure 7.1) are oversized at 2.4m height, muscular and have a rough finish, but they remain ordinary people, not heroes. The work, which had included a child, was Engelhardt’s response to the commission for a commemoration of land reform. (Both this and the Marx and Engels sculpture did not meet with favour from the Party authorities.)2 These developments represented a retreat from the universal

1

Lutz Brandt, interview with the author, April 2011. For a fascinating account of the artist’s experience with the authorities, see Friedrich Nostitz, ‘Schon einmal suchten die Bronzefiguren ihren Platz’, Berliner Zeitung, 11.9.2010.

2

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Figure 7.1 Ludwig Engelhardt, ‘LPG-Bauern’ (LPG Farmers), 1977/8. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Walther Reineck, Mecklenburg.

socialist gesture and correlated with the international turn to postmodernism. Simultaneously, there was an official re-evaluation of the idea of the historical city, both through costly old town restoration projects and through historical simulation using moulded slab architecture. This turn arose from both a strategic positioning of the East German state in a longer German history as well as a pragmatic solution to creating the feel of a historical experience as an antidote to years of repetitive (alienating) forms of building. An official desire to enliven the visual and experiential cityscape through the idea of a (faux) historical city and a renewal of a connection to local history allowed for the return of some kinds of light-hearted vernacular detailing which did not contradict the overall shift towards the unreal in urban design and its public art. Humour became acceptable and desirable (Plates 31, 32 and 33). We shall see examples in Rostock in the designed historicization of the old town, but more generally a pop, surreal and illusory aesthetic which emerged alongside existing traditions. However, some artists also used this new territory of the inauthentic to test the boundaries of the acceptable, making harder the task of the authorities to judge political rectitude. Gable painting, discussed in the previous chapter, was politically ‘harmless’, if somewhat pushing the boundaries of realism as showing ‘typical’ views of life. Nonetheless, where realism could be defined as enriching the social and pleasurable experience of citizens, as it had come to do (as with the assessment of Vollmert’s sculpture fountains), these works could also be classified as realist. The work of Erika Stürmer-Alex played

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Plate 31 Erika Stürmer-Alex, ‘Vögelfrau’ (Bird Woman), Eisenhüttenstadt, 1987. © Archiv EST.

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Plate 32 Erika Stürmer-Alex, ‘Fisch’ (Fish), Eisenhüttenstadt 1985/7. © Archiv EST.

Plate 33 Stephan Horota, ‘Paar in der Badewanne’ (Couple in the Bath), Berlin, 1982. © OTFW, Berlin.

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with this elision of fun and provocation. Stürmer-Alex used highly artificial colour and materials (polystyrene, polyester, found objects) to create strange and wonderful, sometimes Dadaist creatures. Stürmer-Alex was critical of the regime in the 1980s, and we might read a form of critique of realism in the irreverence of these works, though it is indirect.3 In other cases we might see more directly politically provocative work,4 and some that were sanctioned from a new generation of artists emboldened to push boundaries in an era where the ideological discussions about the proper course of socialist architecture seemed anachronistic. Whilst playful work in the sense of ‘picture-book-like’ and (when outside a child-oriented context) infantilizing was not new, these works were different, operating on several potential reception levels in the way of a humorous aesthetic that could be understood differently by children and adults. This can be seen for example in Hans-Joachim Triebsch’s Hallesche Szene (Halle Scene; 1988), a massive trompe l’oeil showing a tightrope walker who appears to walk between two buildings over an oblivious jumble of public characters ranging from Karl Marx to Mickey Mouse (Plates 29, 30). Heinrich Apel’s 1979 Dresden comic jester ‘Hofnarr Fröhlich’ surrounded by a pig, a monkey and other animals is interpreted by Guth as a reference to the position of the artist in the GDR.5 Lutz Brandt invited pedestrians to a reflection on reality with his Berlin trompe l’oeil gable (Figure 6.2). A number of youth clubs, usually standardized structures in new-build areas, became a space for young artists to experiment with new types of art in keeping with international trends towards multimedia as well as typically wishing to break from the orthodoxy of the older generation. Young artists lost patience with the theorizing of the ZAG, and reinterpreted briefs to create their own radical, societally critical image worlds which were more or less tolerated by the authorities depending on the degree of decodability.6 Thus, like postmodernism in the West, the era represented a retreat from the universalist vision of Modernism but could hardly be seen as a free play of meaning or a reversal of the political orthodoxy. An equivalence with Western postmodernism cannot be drawn because the object of reflection or rejection is not the same. Honecker’s liberalization of the arts allowed for more novelty, but in the context of an increasingly invasive and, in view of Gorbachev’s reforms in the Soviet Union, apparently detached state, a declining economy, diminished budgets for architectural art, idealism was increasingly replaced by frustration.

3

See for example Gabriele Muschter and Bernd Rosner (eds), Erika Stürmer-Alex: Werke 1962–2017 Werkverzeichnis (Berlin: Lukas Verlag, 2018). Examples of Stürmer-Alex’s public art, sculpture and earlier work (clearly related to Klee, Picasso and others of the classical modern) can be seen at http:// www.stuermer-alex.de/ and at https://stuermer-alex-werkverzeichnis.de/. 4 The same trends were emerging in theatre posters at this time, for example in the work of Volker Pfüller. 5 Guth, Wände der Veheissung, 1995, 275. 6 Ibid, 357–69.

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Plate 29 Hans-Joachim Triebsch, ‘Hallesche Szene’ (Halle Scene), Halle, 1988. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2011.

The function of art in public space was questioned; its role in shaping ideology had been lost to the importance design and graphics at a secondary level. ‘Where should the art go?’ asked the journal Architektur der DDR in 1981, illustrating the question with a cartoon captioned ‘Sculptural design for a new build area’ showing planning for daily tours of the tree, advertising column, garden seat, dog kennel, grass, pub, bakery and flowers.7 Not only did design seem to eclipse art, but art seemed to eclipse architecture. ‘Is art becoming a “crutch” for inadequate architecture?’ asked the article – a question which resonated throughout meetings of the professional artists’ (VBK-DDR) and architects’ associations (BdA-DDR) and the ZAG from the late 1970s onwards. Nor did the liberalization of the arts extend to any tolerance for proposals for more differentiated, ‘communalized’ forms of urbanism in the face of a ‘technocratic’ approach to building and a diminished role for architects. The role of the liberal intelligentsia, artists and architects who under Ulbricht had been instrumental in developing and modernizing socialist ideals was marginalized under Honecker and sanctions for any – in fact correctly – perceived criticism of

7

Arch DDR, October 1981, 624.

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Plate 30 Detail of ‘Hallesche Szene’.

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the political course were severe.8 Increasingly, a sense of the need for change, dialogue, and the participation of the individual in socialist society as against the needs of a monolithic and homogenous ‘working class’ was evident in the protocols of professional artists and architecture conferences and seminars. As in the West, society in the GDR was in transition in this period to become more differentiated; architecture and art retained their significance as a discourse for power relations and so also became a site in which these trends played out. The ecological sustainability of the proliferation of industrially built living complexes outwards from the cities in the 1970s was questioned alongside the ongoing concerns about the relationship between a monotonous built environment, particularly for housing, on nurturing ‘socialist communities’. The northern German Baltic town of Rostock, a former ‘Hansa’ trading city, and its suburbs provides the final location for tracing through the historical development of architectural art and its attendant debates in the GDR. Rostock’s Gothic, predominantly red-brick architecture had provided an exemplary case for the socialist realist appropriation of ‘national tradition’ with the reconstruction of the central Lange Strasse from 1953 to 1959. In the 1980s, the strong regional character of the stepped facades, the Giebelhäuser (gabled houses) and the predominance of brick as a building material was also sufficiently distinctive to lend itself equally to prefabricated constructions which corresponded to historical forms, whilst remaining clearly constructed with carefully arranged slabs. In Rostock town centre, a most successful exemplar of this method was the Fünfgiebelhaus (Five Giebel House; 1986) which replaced the historic wardamaged original using prefabricated elements.9 To complement the architectural idea, a range of amusing architectural terracotta creatures – including a fish with legs – by Reinhard Dietrich and Lothar Sell were tucked into corners and windows of the structure. These were playful, referential and even kitsch in spirit but beautifully formed. The sculptor Reinhard Dietrich related to me: ‘At the bottom a big-bosomed woman looks out of the window. This was a fun thing from architects and me because earlier there was a brothel there. Only the older Rostock citizens would have known this.’10 For the square in front of the Five Giebel House, Reinhard Dietrich and Jo Jastram collaborated for five years on an extravagant, mannerist sculptural 8

Counter-proposals for urban development were discussed between colleagues who gravitated to certain ‘safe-ish’ spaces – for example, the design journal, form+zweck. Editors were Heinz Hirdina (1973–9) and Hein Köster (1979–84). In February 1983 the whole issue brought into question the official politics towards inner city reconstruction, for example criticizing the musealization in the spirit of the ‘olden days’ in some neighbourhoods and arguing for living, participatory neighbourhoods. The entire staff of the journal were called up for ‘counter-revolutionary’ activity and lost their posts. Wolfgang Kil, ‘Die Affäre form+zweck’, 2014 http://www.wolfgang-kil.de/thema.php?id=21. 9 Kirsten Angermann, ‘Zwischen Neo-Hanse-Gotik und Ost-Postmoderne’, in Alles Platte: Architektur im Norden der DDR als kulturelles Erbe (Berlin: Ch. Links, 2018). 10 Reinhard Dietrich, telephone interview with the author, 2012.

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fountain Lebensfreude (Joy of Life) (Figure 7.2). The figures in the fountain, twenty metres wide, depict three different intertwined males and females, an acrobatic pair, playing children, animals, birds and sea creatures. One pair is typical of a sculptural trend of the period where a muscular man or men hold a female figure as an object of display above their head in an apparent reference to the joy of life.11 Jastram described the work as a ‘synthesis of water and sculpture . . . to express freshness and pleasure in life and also in connection of the coastal city to the sea’. This neo-historical or postmodern departure was confirmed in the 1982 ‘Principles for Socialist Urbanism and Architecture’, which set out the parameters for reconstruction and repair of historic city centres. This character of this consciously inauthentic, historically referencing, potentially ‘entertaining’ architecture may retrospectively be classified as postmodern, although this was rejected both at the time and since.12 The classification and the manifestations of

Figure 7.2 Jo Jastram and Reinhard Dietrich, ‘Brunnen der Lebensfreude’ (Fountain of the Joy of Life), Rostock, 1980. Photograph © SLUB / Deutsche Fotothek / Uwe Gerig.

11

J. R. Jenkins, ‘From tractor driver to erotic nude’, 2018. Rolf Walter, ZAG Seminar ‘Die konzeptionelle Zusammenarbeit bei Aufgaben der Stadtgestaltung’, Architektur und Bildende Kunst, 19. Seminar, Garzau, 14–15 April 1987 (Berlin: VBK-DDR, 1987), 81; Urban, Neohistorical East Berlin, 2009, 81, 107. 12

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postmodernism in the GDR were highly contentious amongst Modernist architects and theorists who had fought hard to rehabilitate and theoretically underpin a socialist Modernism, and had to wait until the 1970s and 1980s before they were able to re-form a Bauhaus institution which was a basis to explore reformist ideas. The potential for historical themes to give more sense of locality and tradition was signalled in Rostock in the planning for the new districts to house 120,000 people north-west of the old town in 1971.13 As early as 1974, the city planning office and office for architectural art embraced the possibility of integrating themes from the eight hundred years of nautical and trading history into prefabricated urban developments. A concept based on socialist and folkoriented Baltic maritime heritage for these complexes towards the docks would bind people into a closer sense of their locality and present a fresh palette of iconic possibilities for exterior murals with themes such as ‘Seafaring, Peace and Solidarity of Peoples’ and ‘Lighthouse’ and interior murals with themes such as ‘Rostock Past and Present’ and ‘Shanty Stories’.14 The proposal for a clean sweep of street names from international figures to Baltic naval socialist heroes from the fifteenth century – out with Salvador Allende, Martin Luther King, Ho Chi Mihn and Pablo Neruda, and in with Störtebeker and Likedeeler – rumbled on and met with resistance, but was eventually partially implemented.15 In Rostock-Schmarl (construction 1976–9), an energetic programme of artistic and architectural innovation was once again made possible by the motivation of professionals who were able to work within economic, logistical and ideological constraints and develop a spirit of shared creative achievement. Schmarl was planned for 16,000 residents under the leadership of the charismatic head architect of the VEB housing Kombinat (concern), Peter Baumbach.16 Baumbach forged connections with Rostock artists Inge Jastram and Jo Jastram – who worked together with Reinhard Dietrich, Ronald Paris, Feliks Büttner and others – and was a skilled negotiator whether with regional Party cadre or the workers at the cement works.17 Baumbach and his colleagues sought a response to the need for the structural variability of prefabricated

13 Hermann Meuche, ‘Welche Stand wurde bei der Ausarbeitung der bildkünstlerischen Konzeptionen in den Wohngebieten bis 1975 in Bezirk Rostock erreicht?’ BdA der DDR, Seminar 18–19 November 1971 in Warnemünde, BArch, DY 15/356. 14 ‘Konzeption für die künstlerische Gestaltung des Wohngebietes Schmarl 10.10.1975’, Büro für Stadtplanung beim Rat der Stadt Rostock 13.3.74; 8.3.74; HAG des Stadts Rostock 1973–1978, 29.10.74; 17.1.74; 10.1.75, Stadtarchiv Rostock, 1099. 15 Concept from head architect, Lasch, 1975, ibid. 16 Two collectives alternated between planning and building the developments north of Rostock. The other was led by Erich Kaufmann. 17 Jürgen Deutler, interview with the author, February 2012.

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building.18 By creating new slab designs of variable use, they were able to create more private spaces, including individual garden areas for the ground floor apartments. They also created a variety in apartment size and some terraced apartments in Kolumbusring, the forms of which in profile imitated the Gothic gable facades (Plate 26). An original modular slab system for the facades of the protruding front sections of the snaking housing complexes was developed by architect Jürgen Deutler. A white quarter circle module in combination with rectangular elements offered multiple possibilities of arrangements, which contrasted strongly with the surrounding brick patterns composed of several shades from lightish pink brown to dark brown. The effect was striking, and in spite of the nominal reference to rounded window and arch forms and decorative brickwork of Hanseatic architecture in Rostock, in its optical effect it was neither Gothic nor maritime, but more pop – and as it turned out, popular with local people (Plate 26).19 The aim was to create a greater sense of identification and regional identity, but

Plate 26 Peter Baumbach and Jürgen Deutler, Stepped apartments and modular facades, Rostock-Schmarl. Photograph © Jürgen Deutler.

18 Architects responsible for Schmarl under the leadership of Peter Baumbach: Dirk Weise, Christian Brümmer, Edith Fleischhauer, Jutta Holland, Helga Krause, Jürgen Deutler and (office for architectural art) Andreas Lorenzen. 19 Helgard Behrendt, Manfred Schulz and Eberhard Klöppel, ‘Variationen in Klinkern’, Neue Berliner Illustrierte, 1978, 12–17.

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technical considerations were paramount. The variations had to be achieved without slowing the production cycle (the ‘takt’) of the slab production works. Deutler recalled: We went to the works with our idea, but they complained and said they couldn’t do it. Then we sat down for a few drinks and talked them into it. Then there were problems from the heads of the Kombinat, but Baumbach was very used to this.20 Another venture was the use of bricks, varied in colour and surface depth to create artistic facades for buildings in Schmarl, Evershagen and Lichtenhagen. The most interesting of these are where the shape of the brick is integral to the design. Inspired by ornamental brickwork in the harbour at Stralsund, Reinhardt Dietrich had already once used the technique (not on slabs) on the Lange Strasse for Möwenflug (Seagull Flight) in 1966. His designs for the gable walls of housing blocks in Evershagen in 1976 used relief and varied orientations of the bricks to create a set of three curiously digital-looking images: ‘Water’, ‘Earth’ and ‘Air’.21 The idea required good cooperation with the workers in the brick factory and a precise placement plan, drawn up by the artists. Whilst concrete was in plentiful supply, bricks were not.22 Dietrich also recalled Baumbach’s persuasive techniques: We traded bricks for holiday places at the Baltic Coast. A slab had to be done in twenty minutes, and then it had to be installed, or they would not reach their production targets. They were all unhappy about it, but we showed them that it was possible. The bricks factory used prisoners and my inset ornaments made it difficult, but I found one who was ambitious and wanted to do it well. Then they got prizes and were pleased.23 The front facades of six nurseries and one gable for an eleven-storey housing block in Schmarl were created by book illustrator Inge Jastram using the brick patterning technique (Plate 27 and Figure 7.3). These have quite a different, much more interwoven effect. The units, distinguished through three to four colours rather than through layering and turning as in Dietrich’s, have the quality of stitches, as though the final work is a monumental tapestry. The images for the

20

Jürgen Deutler, interview with the author, February 2012. Dietrich also produced ‘Drache’, ‘Sonne’ and ‘Luftfahrt’ (Dragon, Sun and Aviation) on much taller housing blocks using reliefs and mixed colours. 22 By 1978, the number of bricks had to be reduced due to shortages. Letter from Baumbach to Lasch, 1978. 23 Reinhard Dietrich, telephone interview with the author, February 2012. 21

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Plate 27 Inge Jastram, ‘Zahlengiebel’ (Number Wall), Rostock-Schmarl, 1976/77. Photograph © Jürgen Deutler.

Figure 7.3 Inge Jastram, ‘Blumenstrauss’ (Bouquet), Rostock-Schmarl, 1979. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2013.

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children’s nurseries interweave letters and numbers and for the gable an elongated, almost Jugendstil plant form. Other works for Kindergarten buildings were completed by students of the Fachschule for Applied Arts at Heiligendamm;24 a crab, lobster, octopus and goblin have a witty, child-like quality which is exaggerated through their monumental scale. These creative solutions to counter the ever troublesome ‘monotony’ of housing complexes were well received in considerable republic-wide attention in the popular press as well as being featured in Bildende Kunst and Architektur der DDR.25 Baumbach also initiated a plan to encourage the new residents to engage with their own environments. In the summer of 1978, residents participated in a community arts initiative in Schmarl. An artists’ subotnik including Peter Mehnert, Gerd Max Lippman, Rainer Dörner, Ronald Paris, Ludwig Bonnitz, Hillmar Zill, and Christine and Erich Nitzsche invited local children to create artworks on the slab surfaces in Stephan Janzen Ring which divided the entrances (creating the ground floor gardens). The plan was that children would continue to work on the pictures on their own; whether this actually happened is unclear, as is the extent to which this initiative was co-opted by the local office for architectural art (Plate 33).26 Undoubtedly, much more attention was paid to the decorative arts and design than fine arts in the development of Rostock-Schmarl. There are very few visual records or physical remains of works of art in interiors, the vast majority of which were destroyed through the reconstruction of the first years after the reunification. What can be seen from the available documentation is that there was a shift towards humorous and illusory painting and sculpture across the new districts in the north-west, from Lütten Klein to Evershagen, to Lichtenhagen and to Schmarl. The science and space topic (for example, ‘Cybernetic’, metal sculpture, Manfred Kandt, 1973) was replaced or given a treatment which approached a comic style (‘The Application of Science’, freestanding ceramic narrative image, Lothar Mannewitz, 1975). Hyperreal (‘Age and Seasons’, club room of senior home, Susanne Kandt Horn, 1975/6) and magical scenes emerge (‘World of Children and Youth’, canteen complex interior mural, Jo Jastram and Feliks Büttner, 1979). There was one exterior piece, a work completed on site by the artist Ronald Paris on the end wall of an Ulrich Müther designed building on Bertolt-BrechtStrasse in the centre of Rostock-Evershagen. Paris’s work, which employed the

24 The project was under the leadership of Doris Grafe. Student artists were Hannelore Kloß and Peter Buth. Many of the artists undertaking commissions in Schmarl had studied at Heligendamm. 25 Helgard et al., ‘Variationen in Klinkern’, NBI, 1978, 12–17; Jürgen Deutler, ‘Eine Lösung erregt Aufsehen’, Farbe und Raum, 1979, 9–13; Detlef Hamer, ‘Ornamente aus Klinker und Putz’, Norddeutscher Leuchturm, 7 April 1978; Andreas Lorenzen and Reinhardt Dietrich, ‘Bildkunst in neuen Wohngebieten Rostocks’, BK 1979. 26 Isolde Schmidt, in her excellent 2004 audit, Spürensuche, refers to some details about these works in the Archive of Hansestadt, Rostock.

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Plate 28 Peter Baumbach and Jürgen Deutler, Community painted entranceways, Rostock-Schmarl. Photograph © Jürgen Deutler.

technique of using the juxtaposition of colour to create depth and is expressive in gesture, was described by the artist as being beyond the directly political: ‘Here the historical, the political arises from another dimension. Basic social relationships of people – working, loving, fighting – form the ideal components of the picture.’27 The genre of ‘epochal’ paintings moved away from easily decodable realism and presented an allegory of life, death, hope, love, good, evil, and so on, claimed as ‘beyond’ any political system, and open to several readings.28 However, Paris suggested in a 2011 interview that the small figure with the guitar standing in his Evershagen mural could be interpreted as his friend Wolf Biermann, the expatriated singer-songwriter.29 A set of potentially interesting enamel murals planned for Schmarl, which would have brought monumental colour into the area, did not make it to realization as the buildings – a cafe and a swimming pool and library – were not built. These murals were designed in very light, bright colours, one set by Ronald Paris and another by Rainer Dörner.30 Paris’s four semi-figurative designs (Winter, Spring, Summer,

27 ‘Sinnlichkeit und Kraft gegen den Tod.’ Ingrid Beyer interview with Ronald Paris, Bildende Kunst, Heft 4/1977, 171–2. 28 The same approach is present in Roland Paris’s mural for Schwedt Kulturhaus (Plate 20), the monumental mural of Willi Sitte for Halle-Neustadt, and Sighard Gille in the Leipzig Gewandhaus. 29 Ronald Paris, interview with the author and Mtanious El Beik, February 2011. 30 No information was found on the other artists in the collective for this plan.

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Plate 20 Ronald Paris, ‘Triumph des Todes, Triumph des Lebens’ (Triumph of Death, Triumph of Life), Schwedt, 1978. Photograph © J. R. Jenkins 2012.

Autumn) in Hockneyesque colour fuse the ‘epochal’ idea with just-discernible scenes of everyday life in free, rhythmic gestures of both line and shapes. Even more groundbreaking for GDR public art were Dörner’s geometric and illusory compositions, reminiscent of the work of the Hungarian op artist, Victor Vasarely. The art, design and ornament in Schmarl realized the aim set out in the 1975 artistic conception that ‘the citizens of the urban area Schmarl and their guests must not only find the application of the typical Rostock brick facades, but also special artistic elements which are only to be found in this area, which create a varied, attractive milieu’.31 But for all the creative innovation and general popularity, this decorative work was not well received by senior architectural colleagues. For them, Rostock-Schmarl’s solutions smacked of a retreat from ideals of socialist architecture developed from Modernist principles. In a two-day seminar of the VBK-DDR in Rostock in 1979, 195 high-profile guests including Klaus Wittkügel, Gerd Bondzin, Clauss Dietel, Walter Heisig, Ulrich Kuhirt, Helga Mobius, Arno Mohr, Hermann Raum, Willi Sitte, Werner Tübke and Walter Womacka were taken on a tour of architectural art in Rostock, including Schmarl.32

31

‘Konzeption für die künstlerische Gestaltung des Wohngebietes Schmarl’, 1975. ‘Die Aufgaben des Verbandes bei der komplexen Umweltgestaltung und die Zusammenarbeit mit staatlichen und gesellschaftlichen Organisationen’, 1979, VBK Zentralvorstand – 5762, Rostock Stadtarchiv. 32

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Rostock’s chief architect Rudolph Lasch gave the developments the customary foundation in the writings of Marx: ‘When the human being works on nature and changes it, so he also changes his own nature.’ But as well as restating the need to make life richer and more beautiful, Lasch made the new departure in stressing the importance of heritage and making places attractive to tourists from the West – and this would be a new way to be political. By educating local people about the artistic urban design, they could be and were much more involved in participating, he argued.33 But the ornamental solutions in Schmarl were criticized by industrial designer Clauss Dietel for apparently using graphics to solve architectural problems. Further, the differentiation in the architecture and the tenants’ gardens were going towards an individualism that endangered the collective intention; it was ‘a kind of subculture, which we should try to prevent’.34 What was at stake here? The disdain for ornament was undoubtedly ideologically grounded in the principle that the architecture and not its surface should address the need to generate social life. It was a firm rejection of creeping postmodernism which was understood as a capitulation to superficiality. But it was also a sense of the slipping away of idealism in the GDR more generally. Architecture had been charged with the very construction of socialism in the early years – the power of architecture was to represent the power of socialism. The technological-economical approach to architecture that forged ahead ‘like a warship’ saw engineers making the architecture, with artists and designers making it palatable. Deutler was invited to present his work from Schmarl at the 1979 ZAG seminar on colour in Gera. Here, the respectful but unmistakeable hostility to this direction became explicit. Flierl characterized the ornamental solution as simply a last gasp – ‘a helpless attempt by architects, in their impotence to make any progress on the substance of the building in a good functional-aesthetic sense, to try, nonetheless, to achieve something human’.35 According to Deutler in 2012: When we presented our work to the experts, we realised that what we did had not really been understood because they were all functionalists . . . No regional things were considered. These progressive people had problems to accept that building to type was not the answer.36 Deutler acknowledged in his paper that ornament was troublesome for the ‘modern’ understanding of architecture. But the works made a connection to the basis of tradition, the old city and the landscape. Above all, they were popular with the residents. Perhaps it represented a yearning for kitsch and nostalgia, a

33

Ibid. Ibid. 35 ‘Farbe in der Stadt’, 1979. 36 Jürgen Deutler, interview with the author, February 2012. 34

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visually rich environment, or evidence that the people were in control of building production and not the other way round.37 Deutler reflected in interview in 2012: ‘Ultimately, ordinary people want to have a bit of kitsch.’38 Why was this kind of ornament anathema to so many architects in the theoretical discourse of the GDR at this time? The ornamental structural walls and dividers developed in the 1960s had not been condemned in such a way. It seems that the Schmarl decoration was perceived as a kind of metaphor of a masquerade which in the eyes of the would-be socialist reformers referred to the condition of socialism in East Germany. The objections were likely also to have been rooted in the long-standing Modernist discomfort with ornament as emasculating and compromising intellectual seriousness. The ornamental, monochrome geometrical solutions of the 1960s referred only to their own lineage of the form experiments of the Bauhaus. Did they represent a more ‘honest’ aesthetic principle because they did not really function to hide something, or did their geometrical principles beloved of Modernists render them acceptable? Guth describes the whole period of the 1980s as a reckoning with the failed illusion of the ideological meaning of art and architecture in which ornament represented a failure: ‘World questions were no longer dealt with [in architectural art]. The trend towards craft and decorative designs was the victor.’39 In 1981 the thirteenth seminar of the ZAG met in Erfurt. The theme was the theoretical problems of urban design. The critical nature of the seminar had been in preparation for months through the circles of form+zweck and Hochschule für Architektur und Bauwesen (HAB) in Weimar. Flierl wanted to force the architects to make a stand against the increasingly secretive and anonymous architectural politics under the building minister, Wolfgang Junker. Under Ulbricht there had been a kind of personality cult, he implied, and under Honecker and Junker an anonymous technocracy had taken hold. Postmodernist tendencies threatened to undermine all attempts to create a socialist architecture where the aesthetic qualities would develop from the satisfaction of societal needs.40 This was a well-planned and consciously high-risk event to make a protest and call for open discussion on the failures of architecture – and not so implicitly also for the status quo of socialist society. Flierl invited Deutler to present his RostockSchmarl solutions again, meeting him beforehand to advise on editing his text.41 Deutler defended the principle of ornament as separable from the social relations

37

‘ZAG Seminar Farbe in der Stadt vom 15. bis 16. Nov. 1979 in Gera.’ Protocol, Berlin, BArch, DY 15/ 363. 38 Jürgen Deutler, interview with the author, February 2012. 39 Guth, Wände der Verheissung, 1995, 326. 40 Bruno Flierl, ‘Architektur in Prozeß komplexer Umweltgestaltung’, 13 Seminar der ZAG, Erfurt 19–20 November 1981. (Berlin: BdA DDR), 4–23. 41 Deutler potentially requested Flierl to edit, given that due to illness he had written without any other edit. Clearly, the content of ZAG meetings were well understood as having far-reaching consequences.

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which produced it and reminded his audience of Gottfried Semper’s principle of ornament deriving from function. But his final words suggest he acknowledged the difficulties in reality: a solid treatment of design details and an appropriate use of decoration signal the playful command, ability and dignity of the situation. That is important – ‘even when sometimes it is an illusion . . .’42 For Flierl this view made his point: it would just serve to justify the ‘sterile prefab system . . . leaving nothing standing in the way of beauty’. It was irrelevant whether people liked it. Designing the surface would lead to an ‘aestheticization of the status quo’, rather than changing it. Whilst directing his comments at architects, Flierl also suggested that neither architects nor the building ministry were responsible for bringing social change, but, in a roundabout way, the state and Party, ‘the town and regional councils, and in relevant measure the ministry’. For Flierl, treatment and historicization of the surface (this is where he introduced Bekunstung as a derogatory term) was a sign of creeping postmodernism, ‘when we have only just, even if historically a bit delayed, won the Bauhaus for real socialism. We are finally modern, and now we should remain so.’43 Other seminar contributions also criticized the stagnation of the architectural politics. Sociologist Gert Zimmermann argued that variety was a basic social need, but that it had to come in the architecture, not the surface. Raising what had become the contentious issue of residents’ amateur artistic painting of their apartment loggias, he noted: ‘We have to decide what is more important: a considered ornamentation of facades or the people in the rooms behind them.’44 The subtext of these contributions in which the spectre of the historical culpability of ornament came into view was a call for greater democracy. This was also evident in a preparatory piece by Flierl in Bildende Kunst in the same year.45 The entire issue devoted to architectural art was subtly critical of the stagnation of ideas, and probably in an underhand derisory way, the cover of the journal was divided using a Modernist grid, the title in Helvetica, in the centre of which was placed a particularly kitsch gilded statue in Dresden of Friedrich the Great on horseback.46 The booklet of conference papers from Erfurt was published in a hurry, typed and not typeset – the organizers were aware there would be trouble. When a copy reached Junker, he insisted they should be pulped and Flierl punished; however, the VBK-DDR sent out the copies overnight before action could be taken. Flierl

42

Jürgen Deutler, ‘Für eine unverwechselbare Stadtgestalt – Betonung reionale Besonderheiten’, Architektur und bildende Kunst, Komplexe Stadtgestaltung in den 80er Jahren. Publication of ZAG Seminar, Erfurt, 19–20 November 1981 (Berlin: BdA DDR), 64. 43 Bruno Flierl, ‘Architektur im Prozeß komplexer Umweltgestaltung’, ibid, 12. 44 Gert Zimmermann, ‘Für alle Bereiche unserer Umwelt notwendig: Vielfalt’, ibid, 93–4. 45 Bruno Flierl, ‘Bildende Kunst im Stadtraum, Möglichkeiten und Grenzen’, BK 9/1981. 46 Cover, BK 9/1981.

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was accused of counter-revolutionary activity and lost all of his public posts; he was not rehabilitated until 1989. The transcripts of this process reveal that the main issue was the criticism of the ministry, not the ideas about architecture. The picture from the Gera, Erfurt and subsequent ZAG seminars is of an intellectual generation who sought to retrieve a lost idealism and hoped that through a change of course a better form of socialism could be achieved. They believed in the meaningful cultural superstructure as a necessary development towards full communism, although this was still perceived as a distant aim. They saw the Party programme in the 1970s and 1980s as focusing on fulfilling basic housing and welfare needs – which had become stuck in real existing socialism, which inhibited the unfolding of a socialist society. All initiatives and gatherings were under surveillance and co-opted by the Party organizational structures, preventing any kind of organic cultural development. The critics were deeply uncomfortable with the tendency towards built environments which offered a superficial sense of identification, in which the ‘entertainment’ value would prevent a communalized development of socialist life. Opinions on architectural differentiation and individualization were mixed. Whilst a designed variety was necessary, this should neither lead to ‘chaos’ with which capitalist development was associated, nor should it facilitate social hierarchies. Complex Environmental Design as it was being understood was in danger of supplying optimized environments which overlooked the capacity of the inhabitants to partake in the process of generating communal space and life. Almost as a drawing of a curtain by highest political authorities across the discourse of intellectuals, new monumental sculptures were commissioned for public spaces: an Ernst Thälmann sculpture in Berlin (Lev Kerbel, 1986) and Marx and Engels in Berlin (Ludwig Engelhardt, 1986). It seems fitting that Engelhardt depicted Marx and Engels no longer as oversized heroes, but as ordinary people. These commissions were effectively a ‘polishing’ of ideology – a show – where in fact there existed a pragmatic, crowd-pleasing approach to public art rather than any longer ambition for the role of art in realizing socialist ideals. The liberalization of the arts, which had allowed finally for researches and publications into the Bauhaus and avant-garde, reflected only the fact that these ideas were no longer politically potent. The explosive ZAG seminar in Erfurt in 1981 took place a few years before the turning point of Perestroika and Glasnost in the Soviet Union – on which the East German government remained silent – which began a course of reform that ultimately brought down the entire socialist project. These years acted as a pressure cooker in which critique was supressed and self-censored. In Wände der Verheissung, Peter Guth gives a detailed testimony of the final eighteen months of the GDR. He describes from first-hand experience where multiple aspects of policy came under criticism, with power struggles in the ZAG between ‘pragmatists’ who accepted conditions on the ground and ‘idealists’

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who spun utopian visions. In Guth’s account, two branches of thinking developed at the X. Congress of the VBK-DDR conference in November 1988. One saw architectural art as enhancing the city in the traditional way, the other saw the need to shift focus to the condition of the city itself. The latter won in importance, even after 1989. The idea was to reconceive the city in its historical, social, building and functional relevance. Guth’s narrative positions the protagonists of the ZAG working group as fatally idealistic, and, he claims, even those who persisted with reforming zeal were so embedded in the system that they failed to recognize the ultimate fallibility of their own projections: Since 1989 was not in sight even at the end of 1988 all these positions had the character of power struggles. The interim winner was the party apparatus that distorted and falsified the proceedings in the media and managed to undermine the congress.47 At what was to be the last ZAG seminar in Rostock in October 1989, the fractured nature of different interest groups and antipathy between artists and architects came out into the open. With a sense of both liberty to speak and at the same time desperation, each interest group pushed for their own conceptions for a new kind of socialist environmental culture. As new head of the ZAG, industrial designer Clauss Dietel rejected the hard-line functionalist architects and reconceived the role of art as influencing architecture. Architect-designer, Bernd Sikora claimed that it was a loss of sense of home (Heimatsgefühl) that caused so many people to leave the GDR. For those that wanted to stay and create the Heimatsgefühl, there had to be a much better understanding between architects and artists. Sikora insisted that the artists had a much greater potential role than as creators of art works or designers of parts of urban spaces. He argued for a creative rather than doctrinal approach to art and architecture which was flexible and allowed for ideas and revisions.48 With evident temerity vis-à-vis the regime, delegates drew up a declaration demanding an urgent change of course in building policy, one which would involve the creative input of not just the artists and architects but also of East German citizens.49 On the same day, 26 October 1989, crowds gathered at the nearby town hall demanding greater democracy and openness, as did their fellow citizens across the country. Hundreds of thousands more had already left

47

Guth, Wände der Verheissung, 1995, 375. Bernd Sikora, ‘Anmerkungen zum Tagesthema in Zusammenhang mit der politischen Situation in Herbst 1989’, 60–70. In Architektur und bildende Kunst Gestalterische Beziehung von Historischem und Neuem im städtebaulichen Raum. Edited protocol. VBK-DDR Zentralvorstand, 1989/90. 49 Ibid. The declaration was formulated by Hermann Raum, Bernd Sikora, Thomas Topfstedt, Heinz Graffunder and Bernd Hunger. 48

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for the West. On that day too, there was a telephone call between the new GDR first secretary Egon Krenz and the West German chancellor, Helmut Kohl, who called on Krenz to work ‘in the interests of the people’. Krenz agreed to look at freedom of travel.50 The declaration of the artists and architects was redundant even before the ink was dry. The six months between the fall of the Wall in November 1989 and currency union began as a period where the reformers in the Artists’ Union still believed that they could effect change. In retrospect, the meetings and declarations of the months after the fall of the Wall were proven to be once again misplaced idealism. Within months, the architecture and public art of the GDR was deemed surplus to need. The process of dismantling began.

50

SAPMO-BA, DY 30/IV 2/2.039/324.

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Conclusion

The visual arts in public space in East Germany were rooted in socialist realist ideals of architecture and art. One of the central principles of realism was to critically appropriate from historical tradition: in the early 1950s this was the appropriation of national or classical architecture and applied arts drawn from Soviet models of realist painting and sculpture. This ensured the visible distinctiveness from Modernism in the West as it was reimagined away from its radical origins to become a manifestation of neutrality and Western-style democracy. Whilst the phase of national tradition in the GDR as the ideological expression of socialist architecture was short-lived, socialist realism retained its authority throughout four decades of social, technological and artistic developments. In architecture and design, the need to build rapidly and economically using standardized elements witnessed a tension between the orthodox realists’ fear of convergence with Western ideals and the enthusiasm on the part of those who wanted to appropriate Modernist progressive traditions as the basis for a socialist architecture. Many artists, architects and designers were attracted to the characteristic forms and means of Modernism which aligned with a progressive axis of modernity. They were adept at absorbing and reproducing terms and concepts which were employed to characterize each developmental stage of socialism in the GDR and using them to serve the ideas they wished to advance. At the same time, members of the Central Committee also absorbed and reproduced concepts which were essentially novel to the ideological discourse, such as ‘breadth and variety’ and ‘complexity’. ‘Beauty’ was reinforced as an open-ended ideal which could serve different cultural ambitions. Nonetheless, the Modernist idiom (alongside others) was used as a means to reproduce typical motifs of realism allied to the principles of the historical logic of the progress of socialism, the ideological penetration of all areas of life, the central significance of the working person, their productivity and their educational and cultural development. The relationship of the societal person to their urban and natural 201

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Picturing Socialism

environment remained the central theme of public art. The iconography of public art reflected the ideals of collective engagement in service to the success of a modern industrial socialism. For example, a family moving into Living Complex Two in Halle-Neustadt should, according to the artistic ideological planning, identify with ‘The role of the chemistry industry for technological and scientific progress’, and would no doubt be employed in some capacity in the chemical industry. Works of art in the schools and nurseries affirmed the happiness of life, derived from social relations and nature. The disparity between the 1950s realist conception of architecture as an artistic, representative practice which projected and embodied ideals and the emerging function-orientated urbanism of the 1960s was bridged through the critical significance accorded to works of art in the built environment as carriers of ideological meaning. Although planning processes became oriented towards the efficiency of facilitating socialist life and values, the aesthetic, artistic qualities of the built environment remained a defining characteristic. As well as works of art, ornament and colour were retained from socialist realism as an indication of (alleged) closeness to working people’s aesthetic sensibilities. The difficulty came in finding an appropriately modern public art to harmonize with the expansive planning based on typed buildings by the mid-1960s. On the one hand, the monumental outward-facing concrete surface seemed to offer the ideal support for simplified forms, but at the same time, these surfaces and the spaces between looked to be the final point of resistance for a visually tangible ideological intervention in the built environment in which a realism of detail and specificity could be reasserted by commissioning authorities. In addition, architects who sensed the artistic aspects of their profession diminishing did not necessarily appreciate the additive artwork. Effectively art and applied arts often took the role of tempering the architecture, countering standardization through narrative, colour, forms and material variety. Attempts to resolve the difficulties to achieve harmony or synthesis were often hampered by the prioritization of quantifiable results driven forward by five-year plans, particularly as achieving housing targets was a widely proclaimed ambition in the context of economic decline in the late 1970s and 1980s. Architectural critics and theorists such as Hans Schmidt and Bruno Flierl as well as cultural sociologists such as Fred Staufenbiel advanced theories which developed a holistic, environmental approach to the built environment, based on a social-cultural, process-oriented conception of architecture which they believed could redefine and dematerialize its socialist character. Nonetheless, Flierl in particular defended the significance of works of art for their capacity for ‘consciousness building and communicative relations’ within the designed ensemble, but saw these as rather more dynamic possibilities than the fixed conceptions set out by the offices for architectural art.1 But to a great extent 1

Flierl, ‘Zur sozialistische Architekturentwickung’, 161.

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environmental design (or Umweltgestaltung) as a real life process took the place of art as a means of resolving the problems apparent in supposedly rational architecture that did not necessarily foster the desired sense of community, belonging and place. Complex Environmental Design as developed by Flierl was conceived as a route to genuine communalization (that is, the development from socialism to communism) but in practice was applied primarily as an interdisciplinary approach to the design and planning of the built environment. In the context of these competing influences and constraints, a composite of ideas developed which began to form socialist landscapes. Partisanship (political commitment), class-consciousness, the typical, everyday life and closeness to the people underpinned proposals and practice of urban plans and their ideological markers. Ironically, the capacity to implement such large-scale plans at a high tempo was possible through economic and political conditions of state socialism which not only enabled the state ownership of land but also the authoritarian centralized planning process, but these processes hindered the realization of more developed concepts which aimed to foster greater communalization of the built environment and its design. At the same time as the socialist character of architecture was redefined and dematerialized, the visuality of works continued to sustain a socialist imaginary, even where it may have appeared apolitical, for example in representations of nature or joyful scenes. Visual and cultural manifestations and rituals served the purpose of reproducing a way of being and thinking: a wholesome, moral order represented through collective benefits of work, industry, recreation, arts, science and education. Visual representations within the public environment, however individuals may have identified with such ideals or felt indifference or resistance, was omnipresent and helped to form consciousness in the same way as commercial advertising in capitalist societies. Any public art as an intervention into public space, and thus public consciousness, has an overtly political role because it seeks to influence and demands widespread consent on the basis of dominant values and traditions (hence its high potential to generate controversy). For the socialist environment, public art that made an assumption not only of consent, but also of active response was able to boldly proclaim its values in affirmative fashion. Thus, the values of international solidarity, of folk culture, of multiculturalism, of peace, of healthy living, of young heterosexual coupledom, of young families, of motherhood, of childhood, of nature, of learning, work, industry and progress were all proclaimed as affirmative and realist, as central and unquestionable. Even as humour, surrealism and illusion entered the visual expressions in public space in the 1970s and 1980s, these all were essentially affirmative as a response to society. The emphasis on points of social orientation through fountains and play spaces and the Honecker-era shift towards pleasure and entertainment, realized through colourful and even infantilizing motifs such as kites or sunflowers or cute historicizing features, may appear less ideological

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Picturing Socialism

than narratives of life in socialism. The Weltfestspiele also demonstrated that the socialist message could be conveyed through a fresh visual language as part of the urban space where this was active with the socialist message. All these visualizations and their implementation served the premise of collective endeavour, collective pleasure, and consent to the affirmative image. Throughout these developments, there were always two publics: the international public and the East German population. Therefore, whilst I assert the socialist and realist character of GDR public art and architecture, this was undoubtedly a socialism driven by the exigencies of the Cold War, in which arguably the East accepted the Western terms of the competition which was a race to greater productivity and consumer offer. There was an interesting discrepancy between internal discourses which were marked by an intense striving for improvement, and willingness to accept criticism and failings and the public proclamations of success and superiority to the West. This again was reflective of the ideal of a collective ambition rather than any individual achievement. The failures of socialist art and architecture as they were evident on the ground also became part of the socialist imaginary. Such failures could be anything from a lack of visual harmony between architectural space and art work which pointed to a failure of planning, the non-realization of buildings and facilities due to budgetary constraints or in the later years the ‘path of the crane’ mentality, or poor maintenance as evident in the ceramic tiles peeling away from the oncemajestic facades in Karl Marx Allee, or artworks which gradually disintegrated through weathering. This material deterioration contributed to a negative imaginary of life in socialism both pre- and post-1990. The citizens’ movements which helped to bring down the regime between 1988 and 1989 demanded responses to the poor condition of the built environment, both in terms of the fabric and air quality of the cities, and an end to the co-option by the Party of social life. Thus, the built environment which was to be the face of the socialist state was, in its shortcomings, part of its failure. Realist Modernism should not be considered as a retarded version of Western Modernism which claimed political neutrality. Socialist architecture and its art and design were more interesting and more relevant to the historical moment than the oft-asserted notion of a ‘return’ to the classical modern. That era as a period of experiment and reform had been defeated by fascism. Realist Modernism was the product of legacies and influences which both predated the GDR and stood in opposition to it. In spite of the considerable cultural shifts over four decades, the realist principle remained throughout in the complete rejection of form or art for art’s sake, the central importance of figuration as signifying humanist values in art, and the ideal of the built environment designed for the unfolding of socialist life. All of these values were not necessarily realized, and of course the attempt to achieve them was at the cost of the dissonance experienced by many and

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personal trauma for some. The ruling SED Party held a tight grip on power and subjected its citizens to increasingly invasive surveillance in an attempt to preserve its political course. Much of what has been written since 1990 has been concerned with exposing the workings of power and its injustices and the coercion of creativity. As a result of this and the systematic process of devaluation, interesting and valuable works of public art and urban formations from the GDR have been dismissed and often destroyed. Whilst the Party controlled, it also provided opportunities. Idealism and sincerity motivated those who sought to contribute to the art and architecture of the GDR, which was opened up not just to (politically loyal) artists and architects, but also craftspeople, designers and illustrators. One of the most interesting aspects of public art in the GDR is the way in which, in spite of the political imperative to distinguish narrative (socialist realist) art from non-narrative applied arts, creative practitioners were able to cross these boundaries. For example, Rolf Walter, a graphic designer, was also a theorist and responsible for the artistic design of the largest urban development in Europe; Jürgen Deutler, an architect, worked both on the urban plan and the modular products in Rostock-Schmarl; another architect, Sigbert Fliegel, created monumental sculptures for Halle, a standard school building, and a concept for multimedia art in public space; the head of textiles at Burg, Willi Sitte, was also a painter and political functionary. Solutions were often derived through the innovations of practitioners who transgressed the boundaries of artistic disciplines. National art prizes were awarded to craftspeople and in later years, art exhibitions showed all categories of art and design from sculptures to tapestries to cartoons. The creative energy and motivation and distinctive results described in some of the cases in this study came about through this sense of collectivity – a sense of creating something larger than the individual contribution. The textual evidence suggests an extraordinary intellectual engagement and willingness to rationalize and critique amongst both theorists and practitioners. These sources demonstrate the extent to which ideas were formulated through discourse and slowly filtered ‘upwards’, even if within strictly defined parameters. The discussions within the Architects’ and Artists’ Unions in 1989 and 1990 uncovered the failures of much of this ambition, but at the same time idealism and a desire to create something new remained. This idealism was soon overtaken by the political and economic realities as the support structures for artists collapsed, and with it the commissions. Most of the art and much of the architecture has since been destroyed or concealed. Now, three decades on from these events, the scholarship and public interest in the art and architecture of the GDR which is emerging may still feed into a broader reappraisal of its legacy.

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Select Bibliography

This select bibliography includes the main secondary texts used as well as resources for further reading. Butter, A., Neues Leben, Neues Bauen: Die Moderne in der Architektur der SBZ/DDR 1945–1951 (Berlin: Schiler Hans Verlag, 2006). Cooke, C., ‘Beauty as a Route to “the Radiant Future”: Responses of Soviet Architecture’, Journal of Design History, Vol. 10, No. 2, 1997, 137–60. https://www. jstor.org/stable/1316129 Cooke, C., with S. E. Reid, ‘Modernity and Realism: Architectural Relations in the Cold War’, in Susan E. Reid and Rosalind P. Blakesley (eds), Russian Art and the West: A Century of Dialogue in Painting, Architecture, and the Decorative Arts (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2007), 183–6. Damus, M., Malerei der DDR : Funktionen der bildenden Kunst im Realen Sozialismus (Reinbek: Rowohlt, 1991). Drosos, N., Modernism with a Human Face: Synthesis of Art and Architecture in Eastern Europe, 1954–1958 (New York: CUNY Academic Works, 2016). https:// academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/1210. Durth, W., Düwel, J. and Gutschow, N., Architektur und Städtebau der DDR, Vol. 1, Ostkreuz: Personen, Pläne, Perspektiven (Frankfurt: Campus, 1999). Eisman, A., ‘In the Crucible: Bernhard Heisig and the Hotel Deutschland Murals’, in Amy Wlodarski and Elaine Kelly (eds), Art Outside the Lines: New Perspectives on GDR Art Culture (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2011), 21–39. Feist, G., Gillen, E. and Vierneisel, E. (eds), Kunstdokumentation SBZ/DDR 1945–1990 (Berlin: Dumont, 1996). Flierl, B., Architektur und Kunst: Texte 1964–1983 (Berlin: Verlag der Kunst, 1984). Goeschen, U., Vom Sozialistischen Realismus zur Kunst im Sozialismus: Die Rezeption der Moderne in Kunst und Kunstwissenschaft der DDR (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2001). Golan, R., ‘From Monument to Muralnomad: The mural in modern European Architecture’, in K. Koehler and C. Anderson (eds), The Built Surface, Vol. 2 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002), 186–209. Goldberg, T., Olsen, E., Schönfeld, M., et al., Kunst in der Großsiedlung: Kunstwerke im öffentlichen Raum in Marzahn und Hellersdorf: Eine Dokumentation (Berlin: Bezirksamt von Marzahn-Hellersdorf, 2008). Groys, B., The Total Art of Stalinism: Avant-garde, Aesthetic, Dictatorship, and Beyond (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992). Guth, P., Wände der Verheissung: Zur Geschichte der architekturbezogenen Kunst in der DDR (Leipzig: Thom Verlag, 1995). 207

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Helas, L., Rambow, W. and Rössl, F., Kunstvolle Oberflächen des Sozialismus: Wandbilder und Betonformsteine (Weimar: Bauhaus-Universitätsverlag, 2014). Heller, L., ‘A World of Prettiness: Socialist Realism and its Aesthetic Categories’, in E. A. Dobrenko and T. Lahusen (eds), Socialist Realism Without Shores (Durham, NC : Duke University Press, 1997), 51–76. Holler, W. and Kaiser, P., Abscheid von Ikarus: Bildwelten in die DDR – Neu Gesehen (Köln: Walter König, 2012). Jenkins, J., ‘A System of Joyful Colour and its Disruptions: Architectural Colour in the German Democratic Republic’, Architectural Theory Review, 19(2), 2014. https://doi. org/10.1080/13264826.2014.987364 Jenkins, J., ‘Tractor Drivers, Mothers and Nudes: Decoding the Feminine in East German Public Sculptures’, in Decoding (Dictatorial) Statues (Eindhoven: Onomatopee, 2018), 170–92. Jenkins, J., ‘As Good as Apple Pie? Post-unification Germany and the Reception of Public Art from the Former German Democratic Republic’, in Design, History and Time (London: Bloomsbury, 2019), 51–64. Kirsch, A., Dresden – Kunst im Stadtraum, Architekturbezogene Kunst 1945–1989 (Dresden: Saxo-Phon, 2015). Kuhirt, U., Kunst der DDR 1945–1959 (Leipzig: Seeman, 1982). Neumann, E. and Kuhirt, U., Kunst und Architektur – Baugebundene Kunst in der DDR (Leipzig: Seeman, 1974). Papernyı˘ , V., Hill, J. and Barris R., Architecture in the Age of Stalin: Culture Two (Cambridge: Cambridge UnivrersityPress, 2011). Patterson, J., Modernism for the Masses: Painters, Politics, and Public Murals in New Deal New York (New Haven: Yale, 2020). Raum, H., Bildende Kunst in der DDR: Die andere Moderne; Werke, Tendenzen, Bleibendes (Berlin: Edition Ost, 2000). Raupach, B., Gewirkte Lebensfreude: Der Gobelin in der DDR (Leipzig: Kunstundwerk, 2018). Rehberg, K. H., Holler, W. and Kaiser, P. (eds), Abschied von Ikarus: Bildwelten in der DDR – neu gesehen (Cologne: Walter König, 2012). Schlesier, K. et al., Halle-Neustadt: Plan und Bau der Chemiearbeiterstadt (Berlin: Verlag für Bauwesen, 1972). Schmidt, D., ‘Kunst im öffentlichen Raum’, in Stadterneuerung als Prozess demokratischer und kultureller Weiterentwicklung: Perspektiven für Halle-Neustadt (Dessau: Projektgesellschaft Dessau, 1993). Schmidt, I., Kunst in Rostock-Schmarl: Spurensuche (Rostock: Isolde Schmidt, 2004). Stonard, J. P., Fault Lines: Art in Germany 1945–1955 (London: Ridinghouse: 2007). Topfstedt, T., Städtebau in der DDR, 1955–1971 (Leipzig: Seemann, 1988).

Archives Consulted Akademie der Künste (AdK) Berlin Bundesarchiv Berlin (BArch)/German Federal Archives Doku-zentrum Alltagskultur der DDR/Documention Centre of everyday life in the GDR, Eisenhüttenstadt

Select Bibliography

Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (GRI/LA) DDR Collections Landesarchiv, Berlin Rostock Stadtarchiv Sachsen Anhalt Landesarchiv (LHASA-MER)/Saxony Anhalt federal state archive, Merseburg Sammlung Industrielle Gestaltung/Collection of Industrial Design, Berlin Stiftung der Parteien und Massenorganisations (SAPMO-BArch)/Foundation of the Parties and Mass Organisations, housed within BArch

Web Resources www.mural.ch Alex Wingner https://www.moderne-regional.de/ Daniel Bartetzko, Karin Berkemann, Peter Liptau, Maximilian Kraemer, Johannes Medebach https://ddr-kunst.beepworld.de Gunter Schreyer www.brunnenturmfigur.de/ Harald Brünig https://www.flickr.com/photos/eastgermanpics Jim Cooper https://retraceblog.wordpress.com/ Juliane Waack, Ben Kaden www.ostmodern.org/ Marco Dziallas https://www.flickr.com/photos/kunst-am-bau-ddr Martin Maleschka http://www.das-neue-dresden.de/index.html Thomas Kantschew

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List of Interviewees

Axel Bertram, designer and typographer, Berlin, 6 August 2010, interview at his home in Berlin. Brigitte Sieger, widow of Kurt Heinz Sieger – artist and founder of neue form, Usedom, conversation at Sieger’s former atelier, Usedom, 15 December 2012 and further correspondence. Bruno Flierl, architectural critic, three interviews, 23 January 2010, 2011 and 2012 at his home in Berlin and further conversations. Elvira Lätsch, former director of the Plattenwerk, Gross Zeißig, Kulturbund, Hoyerswerda, October 2013, conversation at the Kulturbund e.V. Hoyerswerda and correspondence. Erich Enge, artist, Erfurt, September 2012, telephone conversation. Gerhard and Friederun Bondzin, artists, Dresden, two interviews at their home in Dresden, 22 November 2011, April 2012, and further conversations. Heinz Auerswald, Head of the Kuratorium, Jürgen von Woyski Foundation, Hoyerswerda, conversation, October 2013 at 24 Juli, 2013, Schloss Hoyerswerda. Inge Götze, email correspondance with the author, November 2020. Ingrid Müller-Kuberski, email correspondance with the author, August, 2020. Jürgen Deutler, architect and designer, Rostock, February 2012, interview at his home in Rostock and further correspondence. Lutz Brandt, designer and muralist, Berlin, April 2011, interview at his atelier in Berlin.

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List of Interviews

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Manfred Vollmert, metal artist, member of neue form, Hoyerswerda, 24 July 2013, conversation and correspondence. Martin and Helene Schmidt, Hoyerswerda, 12 April 2012, conversations at their home in Hoyerswerda and correspondence. Peter Biernath, architect and architectural colourist, Hoyerswerda, 24 July 2013, conversation and correspondance. Peter Zimmermann, curator of the Poster Collection, AdK Berlin, 2011. Reinhardt Dietrich, architect and sculptor, Weimar, 21 February, 2012, telephone conversation. Rolf Walter, designer and planner, Berlin, 2 March 2011, interview at his home in Berlin. Ronald Paris, artist, Berlin, 9 February 2011, interview at his home and atelier in Berlin together with Mtanious El Beik. Sigbert Fliegel, architect and artist, Weimar, 1 August 2012, interview at his home in Weimar. Willi Neubert, artist, Thale, 12 March 2011, interview at his home in Thale. Wolfgang Kil, architectural critic, Berlin, two interviews at his home in Berlin, 28 October 2011, 2012.

Biographies

Biographies (born before 1910) Alexander Abusch (1902 Krakau–1982 East Berlin) writer, politician and cultural functionary. Alexander Dymschitz (1910 Reval–1975 Moscow) Soviet literary critic, writer and culture officer in the SZO after 1945. Alexeyevich Fjodorov-Davydov (1900–1969) Soviet art scholar. Alfred Kurella (1895 Schleisen–1975 East Berlin) writer and influential cultural functionary. Alfred Thiele (1886 Leipzig–1957 Leipzig) sculptor. Alice Lex-Nerlinger (1893 Berlin–1975 East Berlin) painter, graphic artist, illustrator photographer. Anatoly Lunacharski (1875–1933) playwright, critic, essayist and journalist and Bolshevik Soviet People’s Commissar (Narkompros) responsible for Ministry of Education. Andrei Zhdanov (1896–1948) Soviet Communist Party leader responsible for the Zhadanovist principles of socialist realism. Anna Seghers (1900 Mainz–1983 East Berlin) literary writer, nominated for the 1967 Nobel Prize in Literature. Anton Ackermann (1905 Thalheim–1973 East Berlin) head of one of three teams flown in by the Communist Party from Moscow in 1945 to different parts of the SZO to implement agreed policy. 212

Arno Mohr (1910 Posen–2001 Berlin) painter and graphic artist, prof. at Berlin-Weissensee. Bert Heller (1912 Haaren–1970 East Berlin) painter, graphic artist and rector of the Berlin Art School. David Alfaro Siqueiros (1896 Chihuahua–1974 Morelos) Mexican socialist realist painter and muralist; worked on collective mural with Josep Renau at the Mexican Electricians’ Syndicate in 1940. Diego Rivera (Guanajuato City 1886– 1970 Mexico City ) Mexican muralist with contracts in Mexico and the USA; visited Berlin in 1956 to promote muralism; published a resolution (BK/5, 1956) together with Mohr, Duda, Frankenstein, Waldemar Grzimek, Heller, Graetz, Sandberg, Toni Ebel and others to ‘paint the many empty walls in this city with subjects in the spirit of the 20th century, so that the impression of ruins and graveyard is transformed to a colourful saturation of joy and our great socialist future’. Edmund Collein (1906 Kreuznach–1992 Berlin) architect and Vice President of the DBA; co-author of the Sixteen Principles of Urbanism; responsible for second section of Karl Marx Allee from 1959; (1966–1975) president of BdA/ BdA-DDR. Erich Honecker (1912 Neunkirchen–1994 Santiago) with support of Moscow replaced Ulbricht in 1971 as General Secretary of the SED; introduced a policy shift to housing and

Biographies

welfare in the 1970s and 1980s; forced out of office in October 1989. Ernst Vogenauer (1897 Munich–1972 East Berlin) graphic artist, designer and illustrator. Ferdinand Rupp (1902–1984) architect; responsible for 1955 developments in Hoyerswerda. Friedrich Press (1904 Ascheberg–1990 Dresden) modernist sculptor and designer for churches. Fritz Duda (1904 Gelsenkirchen–1991 Berlin) painter and graphic artist, 1928 member of ASSO; 1946 founded Arbeitsgemeinschaft sozialistische Künstler. Fritz Eisel (1929 Lauterbach–2010 Langen Brütz) painter, prof. and rector at the HfbK Dresden. Fritz Freitag (1915 Königshütte–1977 Halle) artist; (1947) founded Halle socialist artists group ‘Die Fähre.’ Fritz Kühn (1910 Mariendorf–1967 Berlin) metal artist-designer, sculptor, restorer. Gerhard Geyer (1907 Halle–1989 Halle) sculptor. Gerhard Kosel (1909 Schreiberhau–2003 Berlin) architect with several political functions; active in USSR inc. Magnitogorsk; (1961-65) president of the BdA; (1958–1967) member of ZK–SED. Gisela Richter-Thiele (1916 Leipzig–2000 Leipzig) sculptor; figurative works in public space in Leipzig. Hannah Höch (1889 Götha–1978 West Berlin) Dada artist and one of the originators of photomontage. Hannes Meyer (1889 Basel–1954) Swiss architect; USSR brigade in 1930s; (1928–1930) director of Bauhaus; promoted ‘people’s goods not luxury goods’; 1939 emigrated to Mexico where he held public functions standardising architecture. Hanns Hopp (1890 Lübeck–1971 East Berlin) architect; (1952–1966) President of the DbA. Hans Schmidt (1893 Basel–1972 Soglio) Swiss architect, urbanist and theorist;

213

co-founder with Mart Stam, El Lissitzky and Emil Roth of the constructivist ABC group 1924; 1928 co-founder of CIAM; USSR brigade in 1930s; co-founder of Swiss workers party; invited to oversee industrialization of architecture in the GDR; 1958 appointed director of the Institute for Theory and History of Architecture at the DbA. Herbert Naumann (1918 Dresden–2003 Dresden) sculptor, ceramicist. Herbert Sandberg (1908 Posen–1991) graphic artist and caricaturist; 1945 cofounder of satirical magazine, Ulenspiegel; editor of BK 1954–57; 1972 prof. at Leipzig school of art. Hermann Glöckner (1888 Cotta–1987 West Berlin) constructivist painter and sculptor. Hermann Henselmann (1905 Roßla–1995 Berlin) Berlin architect who realised iconic socialist realist (Weberweise, Stalinallee) and modernist architecture (Leipzig Univ., Jena Tower). Hermann Kirchberger (1905 Berlin–1983 Berlin) artist; 1946 prof. for murals; condemned as formalist and moved to West Berlin in 1951. Horst Michel (1904 Zicher–1989 Weimar) form designer; influential in modernist design; 1946–1970 prof. at HAB Weimar. Horst Strempel (1904–Beuthen–1975 West Berlin) painter, graphic artist, muralist; member of ASSO; condemned as formalist and moved to West Berlin in 1953. Jeanne Mammen (1890 Berlin–1976 West Berlin) figurative-expressionist graphic and abstract artist. Jirˇí Gocˇ ár 1913 Prague–1979 Prague; president of the Czechoslovakian Architects Union. Josep Renau (Valencia 1907–1982 East Berlin) painter, poster artist, photomontage, muralist; émigré from Spain; in Mexico after WW2;

214

Biographies

(1958– 1976 and later) émigré in GDR; employed many collaborators and students in his private art school, in particular (1971–1982) Argentine-born Marta Hofmann, who completed the Erfurt mural. Karl Hofer (1878, Karlsruhe–1955, Berlin) expressionist painter; co founder of bk 1947; rejected differentiation between realism and abstraction. Kurt Hager (1912 Bietigheim–1998 Berlin) member of ZK and Politbüro; influential ideological direction of educational and cultural policy. Kurt Leucht (1913 Ellefeld–2001 Dresden) architect and city planner, responsible for 1950s socialist realist planning in Eisenhüttenstadt and Stalinallee section D. Kurt Liebknecht (1905 Frankfurt Main–Berlin 1994) nephew of communist leader Kurt Liebknecht; president of the Deutsche Bauakademie 1951–61; steered early course towards socialist realism in 1950s, succeeded by Gerhard Kosel. Kurt Robbel (1909–1986 Mahlow) painter, prof. at Berlin Weissensee. Ludmilla Herzenstein (1906 St. Petersburg–1994 Berlin) architect and city planner; with Hans Scharounw sought a modernist re-construction in Berlin Friedrichshain; housing in style of ‘neues bauen’ (ribbon plan) in Stalinallee criticised as formalist; 1964–1971 architect for Berlin Weissensee. Magdalene Kreßner (1899 Schweizerthal–Radebeul 1975); sculptor; many sculptural reliefs in Dresden. Martin Hadelich (1903 Einzingen–2004 Dessau) sculptor; public works in Dessau and Halle Neustadt. Max Erich Nicola (1889 Berlin–1958 Dresden) painter and graphic artist. Max Lachnit (1900 in Gittersee –1972 Dresden) Dresden architect and sculptor, many architecture related works.

Max Lingner (1888 Leipzig–1959 Berlin) graphic artist, illustrator, muralist; his politically affimative 1952 ‘Aufbau der Republik’ porcelain mural in Berlin was subjected to the charge of formalism. Nikita Khrushchev (1894 Kalinovka–1971 Moscow) Secretary of the Communist Party of the USSR 1953–1964; responsible for the de-Stalinization of the Soviet Union and a programme of reform. René Graetz (1908 Berlin–1974 GraalMüritz) sculptor, graphic artist, painter; turned to modernist abstract form after 1970. Siegfried Tschierschky (1898 Gropoli–1965 Weimar) prof. for the artistic in architecture at HAB Weimar; developed the first system of modular architectural elements. Walter Funkat (1906 Hannover–2006 Halle) Bauhaus taught graphic artist/ designer; head of graphics at Burg where he held several leading functions and defended the place of the applied arts after the orientation towards industrial design in the 1960s; advisor to ‘neue form’ as it developed in the 1960s.

Biographies (born after 1910) Achim Felz (b. 1933 Ückermünde) architect. Achim Kuhn (b. 1942 East Berlin) metal artist-designer, blacksmith, photographer. Angela Davis (b. 1944 Birmingham, Alabama) American political activist and scholar; awarded honours in the GDR. Axel Bertram (1936 Dresden–2019 East Berlin) graphic designer, typographer, illustrator. Baldur Schönfelder (b. 1934 Hasenthal) Berlin sculptor. Bärbel Schulz (1949 Jena–2016 Dresden) ceramicist.

Biographies

Bernd Hunger (b. 1953) urbanist, HAB Weimar. Bernhard Heisig (1925 Breslau–2011 Brandenburg) painter, prof. at Leipzig school for graphics and book art; held several art political functions in the VBDK; member of the SED-BL. Brigitte Reimann (1933 Burg –1973 East Berlin) novelist and writer; (1960–68) part of writers brigade in Hoyerswerda within the Bitterfelder Weg programme. Bruno Flierl (b. 1927 Bunzlau) architectural scholar, urbanist and writer; (1962–1964) editor of DA; co-leader of the ZAG (1975–1982); reformer and critic of urban development in Berlin during GDR period and since 1990. Christian Schädlich (b. 1922 Reumtengrün) architecture scholar involved in the GDR rehabilitation of the Bauhaus; prof. at the HAB in Weimar. Clauss Dietel (b. 1934 in Reinholdshain) industrial designer, president of the VBK-DDR 1988–90. Dieter Graupner (b. 1940 Dresden) ceramicist Dietrich Kaufmann (1931 Waldenburg–2007 Ueckermünde) painter, graphic artist, scenographer, muralist; painted 1.9 x 52m ‘Spektakulum’ mural for Interhotel in Berlin. Eberhard Klöppel, (b.1940) photographer. Egmar Ponndorf (1929 Dresden–2015 Dresden) sculptor. Egon Krenz (b. 1937 Kolberg) SED politician; replaced Erich Honecker as first secretary until December 1989 following demonstrations against the regime in Autumn 1989. Elfriede Schade (1930–2015 Dresden) painter. Erhard Großmann (b. 1936 Dresden) painter, graphic artist; public murals in Neubrandenburg. Erich Enge, (b.1932, Rochlitz) painter, muralist; 1976 monumental (6 x 102m) mural ‘Sieg der Liebe’ in Erfurt-Rieth.

215

Erich Kaufmann (1932 in Novi Sad) architect and urban planner reponsible for Rostock housing developments. Erika Stürmer-Alex (b. 1938 Wriezen) Berlin/Seelow artist: murals, sculpture, collage, graphics, polyester sculptures and installations; 1980s peace activist. Feliks Büttner (b. 1940 Merseburg), Rostock graphic artist, scenographer and muralist. Franz Ehrlich (1907 Reudnitz–1984 Bernburg) architect, furniture, interior, typeface and graphic designer; Bauhaus student 1927–1930; influential in modernist design and architecture. Fred Staufenbiel (b. 1928) urban sociologist at the HAB Weimar; 1960s–1980s introduced reform discourse. Friedrich Kracht (1925 Bochum–2007 Dresden) painter, graphic artist, sculptor. Developed modular architectural element system together with Karl-Heinz Adler. Gerhard Bondzin (1930 Mohrungen–2014 Dresden) painter, printmaker and muralist; 1965–1970 rector of the HfBK Dresden; 1970– 1974 president of the VBKD. Günter Tiedeken (1932 Berlin–2019) Dresden painter and graphic artist. Günther Brendel (b. 1930, Weida) painter; from 1969 prof. for painting at Berlin Weissensee;(1964) 35m porcelain freize ‘Das Leben in der DDR’ commissioned for Staatsratsgebäude. Hans Brockhage (1925 Schwarzenberg–2009 Schwarzenberg) wood artist-designer. Hans Joachim Triebsch (b. 1955 in Brandenburg) painter and graphic artist; many works of public art Hans Vent (1934 Weimar–2018 Berlin) artist and muralist; public artworks in Berlin. Harry Schulze (1928 Kamenz–2018) ceramicist, leader of Bischofswerda Keramikzirkel for 66 years.

216

Biographies

Heinrich Apel (1935, Schwaneberg–2020 Magdeburg) Magdeburg sculptor. Heinrich Tessmer (1943, Rottluff–Berlin 2012) painter; (1984-1990) prof. at Berlin Weissensee. Helga Mobius (b.1940 Jena) art historian. Herbert Letsch (b. 1928) scholar of aesthetics and the built environment; prof. at the TU Dresden in cultural theory and aesthetics. Herbert Morys metal artist-designer. Hermann Raum (1924 in Pommelsbrunn–2010 Kirch Rosin) caricaturist and art historian; prof. at Berlin Weissensee. Hubert Schiefelbein (1930 Falkenburg) designer, sculptor; developed a modular architectural elements system; student of prof. Tschierschsky; (1968) prof. at the HAB Weimar. Inge Götze (b. Wangerin 1939); textile artist: (1972–2004) head of textiles, prof. and then dean at Burg. Inge Jastram (b. 1934 Naumburg) Rostock area graphic artist, book illustrator, muralist. Ingrid Müller Kuberski (b. 1936 Leuna) Magdeburg textile artist, costume designer, textile restorer, collage and digital artist. Irmela Hadelich-Nauck (1923 Wolfe–2017 Dessau) illustrator (silhouettes), author, (1952-79) designed over thirty ceramic murals together with Martin Hadelich. Irmtraud Ohme (1937–2002; studied at Burg 1955–60 under Lili Schultz and Karl Müller) from 1981 prof. and head of dept of metal and enamel. Jo Jastram (1928 Rostock– 2011, Ribnitz-Damgarten) Rostock area sculptor; many sculptures for public spaces; 1986 prof. at Berlin Weissensee. Joachim Bach (1928–2015) 1948–64 city planning director Weimar; deputy head architect Halle Neustadt; 1969-92 prof. for area planning and urbanism at HAB Weimar.

Joachim Näther (1925 Waldau–2009) architect (1964–1974) head architect for East Berlin; oversaw redevelopment of Alexanderplatz and Leipziger Str.. Johannes Peschel (1931 Kamenz) sculptor. Jürgen Deutler Rostock architect. Jürgen Seidel (b. 1924 Chemnitz); artist, muralist; stained glass works in Dresden and Berlin; 1961 led a collective of students to create a mural in Coventry as reconciliation gesture. Jürgen von Woyski (1929 Stolp– 2000 Dresden) Hoyerswerda sculptor; many works in H. Zoo; initiator of International Hoyerswerda sculpture symposium. Karl-Heinz Adler; (1927 Remtengrün–2018 Dresden) sculptor, constructivist; developed modular architectural element system together with Friedrich Kracht. Karl-Heinz Steinbrück (1932–2000) metal artist-designer; created many architectural elements in for living complexes in Hoyerswerda Bahnhofsvorplatz and Elsterbogen. Karlheinz Schlesier (b. 1934 Leipzig) city planning director in Halle area; chief architect Halle Neustadt. Klaus Gysi (1912 Berlin–1999 Berlin) (1966–1973) minister for culture. Klaus Wittkugel (Kiel 1910–East Berlin 1985) graphic, type and poster design; (1952–75) prof at Berlin Weissensee. Konrad Wolf (1925 Hechingen–1982 East-Berlin) film director; (1965–1982) president AdK. Kurt Heinz Sieger (1917 Görlitz–2002 Zempin) painter and graphic artist, many works in sgraffito, glass mosaic; porcelain. Kurt Junghanns (1908 Dresden– 2006 Berlin) architect and historian specialised in the early modern, in particular Bruno Taut.

Biographies

Kurt Magritz (b.1909 Johanngeorgenstadt–1992 Berlin) architect, graphic artist (1952–1961) editor of Deutsche Architecture. Leoni Wirth (1935 Dresden–2012 Berlin) Dresden sculptor, architect; many glass works and fountains. Lüder Baier (1920 Dresden–2012 Dresden) wood artist-designer. Ludwig Engelhardt (1924 Saalfeld–2001 Usedom) sculptor; 1985 created Marx und Friedrich Engels on Marx-EngelsForum, Berlin. Lutz Brandt (b. 1938 Berlin) architect, designer, illustrator, muralist; collective for Weltfestspiele; collective for Marzahn art programme; known for popular and humourous works; murals in West Berlin. Manfred Vollmert (b. 1937 Hangelsberg) metal artist-designer; (1959–80) many public fountain sculptures. Margit Schötschel-Gabriel (1933 in Berlin–2017 Biesenthal) Berlin sculptor; several public works in Bernau. Martina Stark textile artist; 1972-78 studied with Willi Sitte at Burg. Nuria Quevedo (1938) Berlin Spanish emigré painter and graphic artist. Peter Bathke metal artist-designer; founder and artistic leader of the artistic production collective neue form 1958-88. Peter Baumbach (b.1940) Rostock architect responsible for innovations in large-scale housing planning. Petra Zimmermann leader of the enamel section of neue form. Reginald Richter (b. 1931 Vienna) Magdeburg glass artist-designer; many public commissions including the ‘Gläserne Blume’ in the Palast der Republik. Reinhard Dietrich (1932 Breslau–2015 Dresden) sculptor; collaborations with Wieland Förster and Jo Jastram Richard Paulick (1903 Roßlau–1979 East-Berlin) architect assistant to Walter Gropius at Bauhaus; socialist

217

realist section C of Stalinallee; head architect of Hoyerswerda (1958–1960), Schwedt (1962–1965) and HalleNeustadt (1963–1968). Rolf Walter Berlin graphic designer, member of Weltfestspiele collective and head of artistic collective for new build Marzahn (from 1975). Ronald Paris (b. 1933 Sondershausen) painter, muralist, enamel mural in Karl Marx Stadt. (1993–1999) prof. at Burg. Rudolf Sitte (1922 Kratzau–2009 Kamenz) graphic artist, sculptor, many works of public art; 1958 co-founder PG collective for architectural art Dresden. Senta Baldamus (1920 in Breslau–2001 Berlin) Berlin sculptor. Siegfried Schade (1930 in Mulhausen–2015) painter, graphic artist, sculptor; 1958 co-founder PG collective for architectural art Dresden. Sigbert Fliegel (b. 1934 Rochlitz) architect; (1970–1999) lecturer for architectural art at HAB Weimar. Sighard Gille (b. 1941 Eilenburg) painter, photographer; (1980–81) 712m ceiling mural ‘Gesang vom Leben’ for Gewandhaus, Leipzig. Stephan Horota (1932 Futok) sculptor, particularly animal sculptures. Toni Mau (1917 Berlin–1981 Berlin) artist, 1957 criticised as formalist and lost post at Weissensee; specialised in silkscreen, ‘Kinderfest’ on Kita in Marzahn. Ullrich Kuhirt DDR art historian authored ‘Kunst der DDR 1949-55’ (1982) and ‘Bildkunst und Baukunst’ (1970) Vinzenz Wanitschke sculptor (1932 Deschnei–2012 Dresden) painter, graphic artist, sculptor. Walter Heisig 1950s director of the Institut für Angewandte Künste in Berlin where he promoted socialist realist ideals of folk art as the basis of art and design; replaced by modernist oriented Mart Stam in 1962; defended ongoing relevance of applied arts.

218

Biographies

Walter Ulbricht (b. 1893 Leipzig–1973 Templin) First Secretary of the SED 25 July 1950–3 May 1971; head of state from 1960; cultivated ideals of socialist architecture and culture. Walter Womacka (1925 Horní Jirˇetín–2010 Berlin) artist and muralist; many prestige commissions including three at Berlin Alexanderplatz; (1968–88) rector of Berlin Weissensee. Willi Neubert (1920 Brandau– 2011 Ballenstedt) steelworker, painter and muralist; through his close connections to the Thale steel industry developed the enamel technique for murals. Willi Sitte (1921 Kratzau–2013 Halle) painter; 1959 prof. at Burg; several political functions, (1974–88) president of the VBKD; 1977 enamel mural in Suhl. Wolfgang Frankenstein (1918 Berlin–2010 Berlin) painter, graphic artist, muralist; many public art works including (1957) canteen mural at timber works near Berlin, destroyed 1992; (1986); twenty ceramic pieces with Hartmut Hornung at U-Bahn Magdalenenstraße, Berlin. Wolfgang Hütt (b. 1925 Barmen– 2019 Halle) art historian and critic; numerous publications. Wolfgang Junker (b. 1929 Quedlinburg– 1990 Berlin) (1963–1989) minister for building. Wolfgang Kil (b. 1948 Berlin) architect, critic, writer; (1978–82) editor of Farbe und Raum.

Members of the Produktionsgenossenschaft (PG) Kunst am Bau (production collective for architectural art) (Dresden 1958-1990) Bärbel Schulz, Egmar Ponndorf, Elfriede Schade, Friedrich Kracht, Johannes Peschel, Karl-Heinz Adler, Rudolf Sitte, Siegfried Schade, Vinzenz Wanitschke, WolffUlrich Weder. Members of the ‘künstlerische Produktionsgenossenschaft neue form’ (kPG) (artistic production collective) (Seidewinkel Hoyerswerda 1958-1990) Founding members in 1958: Peter Bathke, Karl-Heinz Steinbrück, Wolfgang Nötzold, Herbert Morys, joined soon after by Manfred Vollmert, Hans-Peter Jarisch and Kurt Heinz Sieger: further members include Artur Flohe, Dieter Dressler, Fritz Eisel, Günter Peters, Harald Lukschanderl, Hartmut Bonk, Helge Niegel, Horst Jaeger, Karl Heinz Kummer, Herr Augustin, Lutz Bathke, Manfred Vollmert, Marion Hempel, Peter Reichelt, Rudolf Enderlein, Rüdiger Buhlan, Thomas Reimann, Wilfried Fitzenreiter, as well as artists working for interiors and for the International Sculpture Symposium initiated by neue form associate Jürgen von Woyski. These biographies can only represent a selection of the artists, designers, architects, critics and political figures who influenced developments in public art in the GDR.

Index

The letter f after an entry indicates a page that includes a figure. The letters pl after an entry indicate a page that includes a monochrome plate. ABC: Contributions to Building journal 82–3, 84 Abschied von Ikarus exhibition 15 abstract art 45, 46, 92 realism and 61 Schmidt, Hans 94 abstract expressionism 33, 45 Ackermann, Anton 35, 40 Adler, Karl-Heinz 92, 120 Adler, Karl-Heinz/Kracht, Friedrich Serielles Betonformsteinsystem (Modular Concrete Form System) 92f ‘Zierbrunnem’ (Ornamental Fountain) 114f ‘Advancing American Art’ exhibition 36 Aesthetic Essence of Art, The (Burow, Alexander) 82 aestheticism 85, 88–90 see also beauty Afrikanerin, Die (The African Woman) (Geyer, Gerhard) 111, 112 ‘Age and Seasons’ (Horn, Susanne Kandt) 191 Aicher, Otl 163 ‘Air’ (Dietrich, Reinhard) 189 Alchemistenbrunnen (Alchemists’ Fountain) (Wetzel, Martin) 131 allegory 192 American Industrial Exhibition 17 ‘American Scenes’ movements 33 animals, as subjects 117 Apel, Heinrich ‘Hofnarr Fröhlich’ 182 ‘Application of Science, The’ (Mannewitz, Lothar) 191

applied arts 7 Arbeitsgemeinschaft sozialistische Künstler (Working Collective of Socialist Artists) 36 architects 82, 102, 183, 185 antipathy with art 198 architectural art 4, 47, 81, 198 see also Baukunst art and design education 21–2 budgets 24 commissioning 23 exhibitions and publications 24 as a function of design 96–9 gender 23–4 Heisig, Bernhard 102 individual styles 52 Kurella, Alfred 102 Kunst am Bau (art on buildings) 6 scholarship and history making 11–21 synthesis 56 see also synthesis theory conferences, Bauakademie 83–8, 96 architecture 81–2 American modern 46 colour 93–4 functionalist 83 Heisig, Bernhard 102 heritage 2, 48, 187, 194 modular 47 role of 183, 185 socialism 56 synthesis with art 56–7, 91, 103, 104, 133 theory 202 219

220

Index

theory conferences, Bauakademie 83–8, 96 tradition 47–9, 52–5, 57, 72, 185, 187, 201 urbanism 47 VBKD seminar 104 ‘Architecture and Art’ exhibition 9 Architecture in the Age of Stalin: Culture Two (Paperny, Victor) 14 Architektur der DDR 26 Architektur und bildende Kunst (Architecture and Art) newspaper 128 archives 26 art 101, 183, 202 see also ornament and public art abstract 45, 46, 61, 92, 94 Bondzin, Gerhard 135–6 Christian 128 colour 93 expressionism 41, 102 Heisig, Bernhard 102 Honecker, Erich 158, 169 importance of 88 infantilizing 182 interior/exterior 141–2 Kurella, Alfred 86 place of 39–40 proletarian revolutionary art 102 as propaganda 52, 55 role of 183, 185 Schmidt, Hans 90, 91 Soviet socialist realism 51 synthesis with architecture 56–7, 91, 103, 104, 133 theory conferences, Bauakademie 83–8, 96 unreality in 179–82 VBKD seminar 104 art and design education 21–2 art exhibitions. See exhibitions art hierarchy 12 artists 102 agency 45, 104 criticism of 101–2 groups 36–7 importance of 127–8 radical 182 response to critical assimilation 52–5 role of 198 sanctions 183, 185

Artists’ Union (VBKD/VBK-DDR) congress (1964) 102 Artists’ Congress 1970 (VBKD) 134–6 ASSO (Association of Revolutionary Visual Artists) 36 Auerswald, Heinz 211 Aufgaben von Städtebau und Architektur, Die 97 Aufsteig und Fall der Moderne (Rise and Fall of Modernism) exhibition 13 avant-garde movements 21, 32 Bach, Joachim 108, 141 Bachmann, Hermann/Rübbert, Fritz/Sitte, Willi 44 Baier, Lüder 121 Baldamus, Senta Chemieingenieurin (Chemistry Engineer) 129, 130f Balkan Car Podom advertising (Wittkügel, Klaus) 119 Bathke, Peter 72–3, 75 Bauakademie, ninth Plenum of the 97 Bauakademie theory conference (1959) 83–7, 96 Bauakademie theory conference (1960) 87–8, 96 Baukunst (architecture as art form) 4, 18 see also architectural art Baumbach, Peter 187, 189, 191 beauty 81, 96, 177, 201 Burow, Alexander 82 colour 94 concept 91 Ehrlich, Frank 50, 89 Exner, Hermann 89–90 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von 91 Heller, Leonid 132 Magritz, Kurt 86 ornament 90–3 Schmidt, Hans 85, 87–90, 94, 95–6 Bebernis, Heinz Völkerfreundschaft (Friendship of the People) 111 Becher, Johannes 32, 35 Beglückungsideologie (ideology of just keeping people happy) 174 Benzolringen (Benzol Rings) Funkat, Walter (student collective under) 131

Index

‘Berg- und Energiearbeiter der Region, Die’, The Miners and Energy Workers of the Region (Eisel, Fritz) 70pl–1pl Bergstrasse/Zellscher Weg, Dresden (university complex) 61–3 Berlin 40 Café Moskau 119, 122 Flierl, Bruno 133 Hochschule für Bildende und Angewandte Kunst (School of Fine and Applied Arts) 63–7 Karl Marx Allee/Stalinallee. See Karl Marx Allee, Berlin Klub der Kulturschaffenden 89 Lenin monument 136 Marx-Engels Forum (Engelhardt, Ludwig) 197 murals 122 Palast der Republik 153–4 ‘Reflexionen’ (Reflections) trompe l’oeil mural, Warschauer Strasse (Brandt, Lutz) 175, 176f, 182 Rundfunkgebaude (Radio Building), Berlin-Adlershof 146–7 Technology Centre, Berlin-Wuhlheide 147 typography 118–19f urban planning 49 Weissensee 63 ‘Working Collective of Socialist Artists’ 41 Bertram, Axel 158, 160–1, 211 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) emblem 159pl X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) poster 161pl Beziehung des Menschen zu Natur und Technik, Die (The Relationship of People to Nature and Technology) (Renau, Josep) 2, 154 Biermann, Wolf 171, 192 Biernath, Peter 212 Bildende Kunst journal 26, 196 bildende kunst magazine 38–40, 41–2 Bildende Kunst + Architektur catalogue 24 Bilderstreit (argument about art) 12, 14–16 Bildungszentrum (Education Centre), Halle-Neustadt 147–8

221

Bitterfelder Weg 8 Blume, G. 72 ‘Blumenstrauss’ (Bouquet) (Jastram, Inge) 189, 190f Bondzin, Friederun 211 Bondzin, Gerhard 22, 135–6, 211 ‘Mensh und Natur’ (Man and Nature) 124f Weg der Roten Fahne, Der (The Path of the Red Flag) 1, 2f, 3f, 120, 128 Brade, Christian 117 Brade, Helmut 118 Brandt, Lutz 171 n.36, 211 housing 179 ‘Reflexionen’ (Reflections) trompe l’oeil mural, Warschauer Strasse, Berlin 175, 176f, 182 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) 158–9, 163, 167–8 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) flag tower 161, 162pl Brennan, Marcia 139 brickwork 188–91 Britain 31 Brockhage, Hans 121 Brunnenplastik (fountain sculpture) (Vollmert, Manfred) 115, 116f budgets 24 Büros for Architekturbezogene Kunst (offices for architectural art) 23 Burow, Alexander Aesthetic Essence of Art, The 82 Butter, Andreas/Hartung, Ulrich 14–15 Caden, Gert 42 Café Moskau, Berlin 119, 122 Charter of Athens (Le Corbusier) 108 ‘Chemie und Landwirtschaft’ (Chemistry and Agriculture) (Grunemann, Rudolf) 129, 130f ‘Chemie und Landwirtschaft’, Chemistry and Agriculture (Kuberski, Ingrid Müller) 125pl Chemiebrunnen (Chemistry Fountain) (Ohme, Irmtraud) 115, 130f, 131 Chemieingenieurin (Chemistry Engineer) (Baldamus, Senta) 129, 130f children 182 as artists 191 as subjects 117

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Index

Christianity 128 CIA 36 CIAM (Congrès internationaux d’architecture moderne) 49 n.9 cinema 143–4 city, the 135–6, 198 see also urban development and urban planning historical 180, 186 classical modern 16 Cold War, the 45, 99 see also Cuban Missile Crisis Collein, Edmund 105 colour 93–6, 120 Munich Olympic Games 163 Neubert, Willi 140 Paris, Ronald 192 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) 161, 163 ‘Colour in Architecture and Urbanism’ (Schmidt, Hans) 94 commissioning 23 communism 36 communist surround 19 community arts 191, 192pl Complex Environmental Design 4, 10, 51, 112–13, 132–6, 197 acceptance of 173 Flierl, Bruno 98, 132–3, 173, 174, 203 Halle-Neustadt 113, 145 Lange, Torsten 18 Marzahn 173 in practice 122–8 Walter, Rolf 174 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) 172 concrete 119, 143 conference Bauakademie (1959) 83–7, 96 conference Bauakademie (1960) 87–8, 96 Constructivism 32 contract givers 23 ‘Contributions to Architectural Research, Architecture and Art’ (ISA) 132–3 Cooke, Catherine 51 ‘Corpuscular and Waves Theory’ (Kreßner, Magdalene) 61 craftspeople 205 Cremer, Fritz 102, 105 critical assimilation 48–51 artists response 52–5 Cuban Missile Crisis 98

Cubbin, Tom 19 currency 40 ‘Cybernetic’ (Kandt, Manfred) 191 Das Ufer 36 Davis, Angela 168 dead forms 89 democracy 35 Der ruf 37 design 51, 81 see also Complex Environmental Design architectural art as a function of 96–9 metal design 115 public space 172 role of 183 designers 128, 144, 158–9, 205 Designing for Socialist Need (Pfützner, Katharina) 18 destruction 43–4, 205 deterioration 204 Detroit Industry (Rivera, Diego) 42 Deutler, Jürgen 188–9, 194–6, 205, 211 Deutsche Akademie der Künste plenum 133 Deutsche Architektur/Architektur der DDR journal 26, 82, 90–1, 94, 95 Deutsche Fotothek 44 ‘Die Biologin’ (The Biologist) (Stark, Martina) 127f Die Fähre 36 Diehl, Helmut 147 Dietel, Clauss 194, 198 Dietrich, Reinhard 185, 189, 211 ‘Air’ 189 ‘Earth’ 189 Möwenflug (Seagull Flight) 189 ‘Water’ 189 Dietrich, Reinhard/Jastram, Jo Lebensfreude (Joy of Life) fountain 185–6f dissidence 13 documenta II exhibition 36 dokumenta exhibition 37 Donndorf, Siegfried Grosskraftwerk Hirschenfeld 42, 43f Dörner, Rainer 192, 193 Dresden 67 mural disputes 128 ‘Prof. Dr Fetscher’ student housing 58, 60

Index

Pusteblumen (Dandelions) (Wirth, Leonie) 113, 114f seventh ZAG seminar 174 student housing, Güntzstrasse 59–60f Technische Hochschule (TH; Technical College) 58–9 university complex, Bergstrasse/ Zellscher Weg 61–3 Weg der Roten Fahne, Der (The Path of the Red Flag) (Bondzin, Gert) 1, 2f, 3f, 120, 128 Dresden-Südvorstadt 60 Drosos, Nikolaos 57 Duda, Fritz 36 ‘Earth’ (Dietrich, Reinhard) 189 economy, the 40 education 21–2 Ehrlich, Frank 50, 89–90, 177 Einheit der Arbeiterklasse und die Gründung der DDR, Die (The Unity of the Working Class and the Foundation of the GDR) (Renau, Josep) 150 Eisel, Fritz ‘Berg- und Energiearbeiter der Region, Die’, The Miners and Energy Workers of the Region 70pl–1pl ‘Mensch bezwingt den Kosmos, Der’ (Man Conquers the Cosmos) 130f Eisenhüttenstadt 69pl, 75f see also Stalinstadt Eisman, April 15 ‘Elementare Erscheinungen der Physik’ (Wittig, Rudolf) 61 Elemente in Nature and Technik (The Four Elements in Nature and Technology) (Landgraf, Willhelm) 61 emigration 198–9 enamel 137–41 Enge, Erich 211 ‘Kosmonaut’ (Cosmonaut) 131f Lenin’s Worte wurden Wahr (Lenin’s Words Become True) 135f, 136 Sieg der Liebe über die Finsternis (Victory of Love over Darkness) 153

223

Engelhardt, Ludwig 104 LPG-Bauern 179–80f Marx-Engels Forum, Berlin 197 ensemble, the 17, 18 environmental design 98, 122, 164, 203 see also Complex Environmental Design epochal paintings 192 Erde hat Genug Brot für Alle, Die (The Earth has Enough Bread for Everyone) (Hadelich, Irmela and Martin) 111pl, 112 Erfurt 2, 22, 146, 154, 195, 196, 197 Ernst Thälman sculpture (Kerbel, Lev) 197 ethnic tradition 72 Evershagen 189 exhibitions 24 Abschied von Ikarus 15 ‘Advancing American Art’ 36 ‘Architecture and Art’ 9–10f Aufsteig und Fall der Moderne (Rise and Fall of Modernism) 13 documenta II 36 dokumenta 37 Fotomontage von Dada bis Heute 37 General Art Exhibition Dresden (1949) 42–4 ‘Great German Art’ 38 Kunst in der DDR 15 Künstler Schaffen für den Friden (Artists Create for Peace) 37–8 X. 6 Exner, Hermann 89–90 expressionism 41, 102 Fachschulen (polytechnics) for Applied Arts 22 Fahne (Flag or Flame of the Revolution) (Fliegel, Sigbert) 143 Farbe und Raum (colour and space) trade publication 26, 175 Faust (Fist) Fliegel, Sigbert 143 Feinmechanik Zeiss-Ikon (Nicola, Max Erich) 42, 43f Feist, Peter 178 Felz, Achim 177 fifth Artists’ Union (VBKD) congress (1964) 102 film 143–4 ‘Fisch’, Fish (Stürmer-Alex, Erika) 181pl

224

Index

Fitzenreiter, William Schwimmerin, Die (The Swimmer) 111 Fjodorov-Davydov, Alexeyevich 56 Fleischmann 117 Fliegel, Sigbert 107–8, 143–5, 205, 212 Fahne (Flag or Flame of the Revolution) 143 Faust (Fist) 143 Object 14 143 spatial relations 143–5 Flierl, Bruno 5, 83, 85–6, 87, 88, 202–3, 211 colour 94 Complex Environmental Design 98, 132–3, 173, 174, 203 Deutsche Architektur/Architektur der DDR journal 78, 95 Hoyerswerda 78 ornament 194, 196 seventh ZAG seminar, Dresden 174 socialism theory 133–4, 136 thirteenth ZAG seminar, Erfurt 196–7 urban design 195–6 VBKD seminar 104 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) 172 Flugwille des Menschens (The Human Will to Flight) (Lachnit, Max) 58, 59f Form und Zweck/form+zweck journal 7, 26, 185 n.8 formalism 4, 8, 44, 45, 50, 93 Fotomontage von Dada bis Heute exhibition 37 fountains 113–16, 122, 131, 185–6f Frankenstein, Wolfgang 104 Franz B. from Steglitz 39 Franziska Linkerhand (Reimann, Brigitte) 77 Frauen und Technologie (Women and Technology) (Lachnit, Max) 62 ‘Freiheit der sozialistischen Persönlichkeit’ (Sitte, Willi) 142 Freitag, Fritz 120 ‘Freundschaft’ (Friendship) (Sitte, Willi) 126f ‘friedliche Nutzung der Atomenergie, Die’, The Peaceful Use of Atomic Energy (Renau, Josep) 147pl

From the Lives of People Today Grzimek, Waldemar/Schiefelbein, Hubert/ Schamal, Karl-Heinz 122 From the Lives of the Peoples of the Soviet Union (Heller, Bert) 122 Froöde, Doris 120 Fünfgiebelhaus (Five Giebel House), Rostock 185 Funkat, Walter (student collective under) Benzolringen (Benzol Rings) 131 gable painting 175, 180 Galerie Gerd Rosen 36 Geiler, Otto 50 ‘Gemeinschaftsarbeit der sozialistischen Länder’, Collective Work of Socialist Countries (Womacka, Walter) 69pl, 70pl, 138 gender 23–4, 139 General Art Exhibition Dresden (1949) 42–4 Germany division 46 rapprochement 158 Geyer, Gerhard 119 Afrikanerin, Die (The African Woman) 111, 112 ‘Vier Wissenschaftler aus vier Jahrhunderten (Four Scientists from Four Centuries) 129f Wissenschaftswürfel (Science Cube) 129 Giebel Wettbewerben (gable wall mural competitions) 175 Gilles, Sighard Song of Life 141 ‘Glasbrunnen’ (Glass Fountain) (Wirth, Leonie) 115f Gläserne Blume (Glass Flower) (Wilhelm, Richard O./Richter, Reginald) 121 glass 121 Glöckner, Hermann Spektral Analyse (Spectral Analysis) 62 Gocˇár, Jirˇí 87 Goeschen, Ulrike Vom Sozialistischen Realismus zur Kunst im Sozialismus 14 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von 91 Golan, Romy 33

Index

Götze, Inge 126 Leben in Sozialismus, Das (Life in Socialism) 126–7 ‘Lob der Poesie’ (In Praise of Poetry) 125f Graetz, René 147–8 Graupner, Dieter 121 ‘Great German Art’ exhibitions 38 Greenberg, Clement 33 Grohmann, Kurt 117 Gropius, Walter 46 Grosskraftwerk Hirschenfeld (Donndorf, Siegfried) 42, 43f Groys, Boris 19 Total Art of Stalinism, The 14 Grunemann, Rudolf ‘Chemie und Landwirtschaft’ (Chemistry and Agriculture) 129, 130f Grzimek, Waldemar/Schiefelbein, Hubert/ Schamal, Karl-Heinz From the Lives of People Today 122 Guernica (Picasso, Pablo) 34, 146 Güntzstrasse student housing, Dresden 59–60f Guth, Peter 195 Wände der Verheissung (Walls of Promises) 12, 197–8 Gysi, Klaus 134–5 Hadelich, Irmela/Hadelich, Martin Erde hat Genug Brot für Alle, Die (The Earth has Enough Bread for Everyone) 111pl, 112 Hadelich, Martin Junges Pärchen (Young Couple) 113 Ziegenreiterin (Goat Rider) 112 Hafenszene (Harbour Scene) (Robbel, Kurt) 66, 67pl Hager, Kurt 134 Halle-Neustadt 99, 101, 105–9, 202 artistic developments 109–10 artists’ cooperation 112 Beirat für bildende Kunst und Baukunst (Council for Art and Building Art) 109–10 Bildungszentrum (Education Centre) 147–8 fountains 113–16, 131

225

innovation with traditional materials 121–2 Kulturhalle (cultural centre) 141f–2f material innovation 119–21f murals 148f–50 Plasteblock 119–20 playgrounds, play structures, children and animals 112, 113, 117 political works 131 public space 113, 116–17, 143–4f realism in public art 137–53 reliefs and structural elements 116–17, 118f tapestries 126 themes 110f, 111, 129–31, 145, 150 typographic design 118–19 VEB Energy Building 147f Hallesche Szene (Halle Scene) (Triebsch, Hans-Joachim) 182, 183pl, 184pl happiness 177, 186 see also humour Haus des Lehrers (House of Teachers) (Henselmann, Hermann) 7–9f Haus des Lehrers (House of Teachers) frieze [Unser Leben (Our Life)] (Womacka, Walter) 7–9f, 67, 69 Heidig, Marlene 15 Heimatsgefühl (identification with home and locality) 73, 198 Heisig, Bernhard 15, 102, 103 Heller, Bert 41, 64 From the Lives of the Peoples of the Soviet Union 122 Hochschule für Bildende und Angewandte Kunst etchings 64 Umseidler, Heimkehrer (Resettlers, Homecomers) 41 Heller, Leonid ‘World of Prettiness, A’ 132 Henselmann, Hermann 39, 102 Haus des Lehrers (House of Teachers) 7–9f heritage 2, 48, 187, 194 Herzenstein, Ludmilla 47 Hilscher, Rudolf Taubenflug (Flight of Doves) 112, 113 Vater und Sohn (Father and Son) 111–12 Hirdina, Heinz 172 historicism 179–80, 187 Höch, Hannah 37

226

Index

Hochschule für Bildende Künste (Academy of Arts) 22 Hochschule für Bildende und Angewandte Kunst (School of Fine and Applied Arts) 63–7 Hofer, Karl 40 ‘Hofnarr Fröhlich’ (Apel, Heinrich) 182 Honecker, Erich 10, 105, 153, 157 art 158, 169 Flierl, Bruno 195 housing 174 status reversal 168 Hopp, Hans 82, 86–7 Horn, Susanne Kandt ‘Age and Seasons’ 191 Horota, Stefan 117 181 ‘Paar in der Badewanne’, Couple in the Bath 181pl housing 174, 179 Hoyerswerda 69–76f, 108 colour 94 as failure of urbanity 76–8 ‘Haus der Berg- und Energiearbeiter ‘71pl Reimann, Brigitte 77–8 Zoo 64, 65f humour 180–2, 185, 191 Hütt, Wolfgang 127 ideology 19–20 Ikarus (Sitte, Willi) 124 illustrators 189, 205 imaginary 13 social 5 socialist 5, 101, 203, 204 individualism 178, 185, 194 industrialization 6–7 industrialized building 56–8, 72, 75–8, 101 see also Halle-Neustadt and standardized architecture art 88 questioning 185 Rostock 185, 187–9 Schmidt, Hans 82–5, 87–8 threat to architects 82 Industries of California (Stackpole, Ralph) 42 industry, as subject 42–4 Institut für Baugebundene Kunst (Institute for Building-Related Art) 22

Institut für künstlerische Werkgestaltung (Institute for Artistic Craft) 21 intellectual/cosmopolitan/machineoriented approaches 48 ‘International Soldarität’, International Solidarity (Neubert, Willi) 120f interpretation 129–32 Jastram, Inge 187, 189–91 ‘Blumenstrauss’ (Bouquet) 189, 190f, 191 ‘Zahlengiebel’, Number Wall 189, 190pl Jastram, Jo 186,187 Jastram, Jo/Büttner, Felix ‘World of Children and Youth’ 191 Jastram, Jo/Dietrich, Reinhard Lebensfreude (Joy of Life) fountain 185–6f Jung, Regina 122 Junges Paar (Young Pair) (Wetzel, Martin) 112 Junges Pärchen (Young Couple) (Hadelich, Martin) 113 Junghanns, Kurt 83, 85, 87 Junker, Wolfgang 133–4, 195, 197 Kandt, Manfred ‘Cybernetic’ 191 Karl Marx Allee/Stalinallee, Berlin 50, 52, 53f–4f, 113 landscape planning 122 plans 123f typographical design 118–19f Karl Marx bust (Kerbel, Lev) 1 Kelly, Catriona 25 Kerbel, Lev Ernst Thälman sculpture 197 Karl Marx bust 1 Kerschek, Hans 78 n.72 Khrushchev, Nikita 48 industrialized building 56–7 ornament 57 Kil, Wolfgang 175, 177, 212 Kinder und Ihre Umwelt (Children and their Environment) (Wagner, Johannes) 112 ‘Kinderreigen’ (Children’s Ring-a-Ring of Roses) (Woyski, Jürgen von) 65f

Index

Kirchberger, Hermann 44 Kirsch, Antje 13 klassovost (class consicousness) 58 Klaus Renft Combo 171 Klub der Kulturschaffenden, Berlin 89 Kohl, Helmut 199 Köhring, Alexandra/Rüthers, Monica Socialist Aesthetics 17 Kollwitz, Käthe/Kreßner, Magdalene Trauende (Grieving Woman) 37 Komplexe Umweltgestaltung. See Complex Environmental Design Kosel, Gerhard 95 ‘Kosmonaut’ (Cosmonaut) (Enge, Erich) 131f KPD (Kommunistisches Partei Deutschlands) 34, 35 Krenz, Egon 199 Kreßner, Magdalene ‘Corpuscular and Waves Theory’ 61 ‘Musizierende Kinder beim Karneval’ (Children Making Music at the Carnival) 62f Kreßner, Magdalene/Kollwitz, Käthe Trauende (Grieving Woman) 37 Kriegsbrandstifter sind Verbrecher! (Arsonists of War are Criminals) (Lahn, Willy) 41 Kuberski, Ingrid Müller ‘Chemie und Landwirtschaft’, Chemistry and Agriculture 125pl Kuhirt, Ullrich 9, 102 Kühn, Achim 122 Kühn, Fritz 91, 92, 122 Kulturbund zur demokratischen Erneuerung Deutschlands (Cultural Association for Democratic Renewal in Germany) 35 Kulturkammer (Chamber of Creative Artists) 35 Kunst am Bau (art on buildings) 6 see also architectural art and public art Kunst in der DDR exhibition 15 Künstler Schaffen für den Friden (Artists Create for Peace) exhibition 37–8, 39 Künstleraktiv 36

227

künstlerische Produktionsgenossenschaft neue form. See neue form Kunstvolle Oberflächen des Sozialismus (Artistic Surfaces of Socialism) (Helas, Luise/Rambow, Wilma/ Rössl, Felix) 12–13 Kurella, Alfred 32, 86, 102 Lachnit, Max 60 Flugwille des Menschens (The Human Will to Flight) 58, 59f Frauen und Technologie (Women and Technology) 62 ‘Lehre und Forschung’ (Teaching and Research) 61f ‘Wissenschaftler und Künstler’ (Scientists and Artists) 63f Lahn, Willy Kriegsbrandstifter sind Verbrecher! (Arsonists of War are Criminals) 41 Lammert, Ule 133–4 land ownership 17–18 Landgraf, Willhelm Elemente in Nature and Technik (The Four Elements in Nature and Technology) 61 Lange, Torsten 18 Langner, Reinhold 60 Stadtgeschichte Dresdens (Story of the City of Dresden) 59 Lasch, Rudolph 194 Lausitzer Rundschau newspaper 78 Le Corbusier Charter of Athens 108 Leben in Sozialismus, Das (Life in Socialism) (Götze, Inge) 126–7 Lebensbaum (Tree of Life) (Neubert, Willi) 139pl–40 Lebensfreude (Joy of Life) fountain (Dietrich, Reinhard/Jastram, Jo) 185–6f Lehre und Forschung’ (Teaching and Research) (Lachnit, Max) 61f Leibe, Otto 117 Schildkröte (Tortoise) 117 Spielelefant (Play Elephant) 117 Leipzig Ringbebauung 55 Roßplatz 52

228

Index

Volkerkundemuseum (Anthropology Museum)/Grassi Museum, Wilhelm Leuschner Platz 52, 53f Lenin’s Worte wurden Wahr (Lenin’s Words Become True) (Enge, Erich) 135f, 136 Lernende Frau, Die (The Learning Women) (Rataiczyk, Rosemarie/ Rataiczyk, Werner) 127 Letsch, Herbert 88–9, 90 Leucht, Kurt 50 Lex-Nerlinger, Alice 42 Liebknecht, Kurt 50, 83–4 liminality 167–8, 170 Linfert, Carl 39 Linger, Max 22 LKW Tatra Motokov advertising (Wittkügel, Klaus) 119pl ‘Lob der Poesie’ (In Praise of Poetry) (Götze, Inge) 125f LPG-Bauern (Engelhardt, Ludwig) 179–80f Lunacharski, Anatoly 51 Magritz, Kurt 86 Maleschka, Martin 15 Mammen, Jeanne 31 Mannewitz, Lothar ‘Application of Science, The’ 191 Marx-Engels Forum, Berlin (Engelhardt, Ludwig) 197 Marxism 178 Marzahn 172–5 material innovation 119–22 Matthias, Carl Ernst 40 Mau, Toni 64 Mauresken (Ohme, Irmtraud) 115 Mensch – Beherrscher der Natur, Der (Man – Master of Nature) (Renau, Josep) 150, 151pl–2pl, 153 ‘Mensch bezwingt den Kosmos, Der’ (Man Conquers the Cosmos) (Eisel, Fritz) 130f ‘Mensh und Natur’ (Man and Nature) Bondzin, Gerhard 124f Menzel, Armin 11 Merkel, Ina 171 Meuser, Natascha 13 Mexican murals 33, 138, 153–4 Mexico Olympic Games 170

Meyer, Hannes 84 Michael, Peter Regenwum einen Pilz und zwei Blüten (Earthworm, a Mushroom and Two Petals) 117 Modernism 4, 7, 9, 16, 20, 201 antipathy to 38 axes of 33–4 effect of fascism 35–6 murals 33–4 Nazism 33 Ostmoderne (East Modernism) 14–16 postmodernism 187 pre-war period 32–4 realist Modernism 48 reclaiming 14–16 rejection 48 Soviet Union 17 suppression 13 USA 36, 45–6 versus realism 32–3 West, the 17 Western zones 16, 35 Mohr, Arno Wendepunkt (Turning Point) 66pl Monat, Der 36 montage 138, 140, 146 monumental building 49, 51, 136, 197 monumental murals 141–2 Moon Station (Schönfelder, Baldur) 122, 130f Morys, Helmut Hoyerswerda balconies 76f Moscow, industrialized building 56–8 mourning, works depicting 37 Möwenflug (Seagull Flight) (Dietrich, Reinhard) 189 Müller-Kuberski, Ingrid 211 Munich art 38 Munich Olympic Games 163–4 muralism 33 murals 20–1, 22, 44 Berlin 122 Berlin railway station 41 Caden, Gert 42 colour 120 commissions 40 depicting trauma of war 40–1 destruction/removal 43–4 difficulties promoting 52

Index

Dresden 128 General Art Exhibition Dresden (1949) 42–4 Giebel Wettbewerben (gable wall mural competitions) 175 interior/exterior 141–2 Lex-Nerlinger, Alice 42 Marzahn 174–5 Mexican 33, 138, 153–4 Modernism 33–4 monumental 141–2 Neuebert, Willi 138 potential of 33–4 Renau, Josep 146–54 Rostock-Schmarl 192–3 Seghers, Anna 42 socialism 33–4 socialist realism 33–4 technological innovation 120 ‘Musizierende Kinder beim Karneval’ (Children Making Music at the Carnival) (Kreßner, Magdalene) 62f Nacht über Deutschland (Night over Germany) (Strempel, Horst) 41 narodnost (national/of the people) 57–8, 74 Näther, Joachim 152 national tradition 35, 47–9, 52–5, 57, 185 Naumann, Herbert 60 Nazism 31, 35 art 38 art after 39–40, 45, 46 Modernism 33 murals 34 Neo-historical East Berlin (Urban, Florian) 21 neo-historicism 21 Nerlinger, Oskar 38, 39 Neubert, Willi 101–2, 120, 127, 137, 212 enamel 137–41 Halle-Neustadt 117, 118f ‘International Soldarität’, International Solidarity 120pl Lebensbaum (Tree of Life) 139pl–40 Mexican murals 153 Presse als Kollektive Organisator, Die (The Press as Collective Organizer) 138pl–9, 140 Presse, Die (The Press) 1

229

‘300 Jahre Eisenhüttenwerk’, 300 Years of the Steel Works 121pl neue form 72–3, 74–5 Neues Deutschland 50 ‘New Synthesis of the Arts, A’ memorandum (VBKD) 127–8 Nicola, Max Erich Feinmechanik Zeiss-Ikon 42, 43f ninth Plenum of the Bauakademie 97 N Ö SPL (Principles for the New Economic System of Planning and Management of the National Economy) 99 nudes 139 Object 14 (Fliegel, Sigbert) 143 obrazy (‘images’) 52 Ohme, Irmtraud 115 Chemiebrunnen (Chemistry Fountain) 115, 130f, 131 Mauresken 115 Olympic Games Mexico 170 Munich 163–4 openness 169–70 ornament 48, 51, 75 brickwork 189–91 Deutler, Jürgen 194–6 Drosos, Nikolaos 57 Flierl, Bruno 194, 196 Khrushchev, Nikita 57 objections to 194–5 obrazy 52 realist-Modernist 90–3 Stalinallee, Berlin 52, 53f Zimmermann, Gert 196 Orozco, José Clemente 33 Ostmoderne (East Modernism) 14–16 ‘Paar in der Badewanne’ (Couple in the Bath) (Horota, Stefan) 181pl Palace of the Soviets, Moscow 51 Palast der Republik, Berlin 153–4 Paperny, Victor Architecture in the Age of Stalin: Culture Two 14 Paris, Ronald 1, 120, 191–3, 212 ‘Triumph des Todes, Triumph des Lebens’, Triumph of Death, Triumph of Life 193pl

230

Index

parteinost (Party loyalty/partisanship) 57, 58 Party authorities 4–5, 13–14, 34 loyalty 57, 58, 66–7 power 205 surveillance 197, 205 Paulick, Richard 72, 94, 107, 109, 117 Pfützner, Katharina Designing for Socialist Need 18 ‘PG Kunst am Bau’ 13, 92, 112, 121 photographic archaeology 15 photography 113, 160 photomontage 146 Picasso, Pablo 8 Guernica 34, 146 Plan for Monumental Propaganda 49, 51, 56 plastic 7, 119–20, 128 play apparatus 117, 122 pleasure 177–8 Pollock, Jackson 33 Popular History of Mexico, A (Rivera, Diego) 138 Popular/localized/folkish/craft approaches 48 porcelain 60 post-liminal phase 170–1 Post Verbindet Städte, Länder und Kontinenten, Die (The Post Connects Towns, Countries and Continents) (Schaar, Gertraud) 126 postmodernism 19, 21, 180, 182, 186–7, 194 Flierl, Bruno 196 Potsdam Conference 35 prefabricated building. See industrialized building Preiss, Peter 120 Press, Friedrich 58 Presse, Die (The Press) (Neubert, Willi) 1 Presse als Kollektive Organisator, Die (The Press as Collective Organizer) (Neubert, Willi) 138pl–9, 140 ‘primitive’, the 33 Principles for Socialist Urbanism and Architecture’ (Walter, Rolf) 186 Productivism 32 ‘Prof. Dr Fetscher’ student housing, Dresden 58, 60 proletarian revolutionary art 102

propaganda 49, 51, 131 art as 52, 55 public art 5–11, 197, 202 Kil, Wolfgang 175 Kunst am Bau (art on buildings) 6 realism in 137–53 as visible representation of socialism 203–4 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) 157 public space 113, 116–17, 143–5, 183 Kil, Wolfgang 175 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) 157, 164–5, 167, 169, 172 publications 24, 26 Pusteblumen (Dandelions) (Wirth, Leonie) 113, 114f Quevedo, Nuria 147 Rataiczyk, Rosemarie/Rataiczyk, Werner Lernende Frau, Die (The Learning Women) 127 Raum, Hermann 14, 102 realism 32–3 , 201–2 abstraction and 61 Ackermann, Anton 35 critique of 182 gable painting 180 move away from 140 national tradition 57 in public art 137–53 Renau, Josep 146 Ulbricht, Walter 105 USA 32–3 versus modernism 32 Zhdanov’s central tenets 57–8 realist Modernism3, 27–8, 48, 58–76, 79–154, 204 colour 93–6 ornament 90–3 reception 25 ‘Reflexionen’ (Reflections) trompe l’oeil mural, Warschauer Strasse, Berlin (Brandt, Lutz) 175, 176f, 182 Regenwum einen Pilz und zwei Blüten (Earthworm, a Mushroom and Two Petals) (Michael, Peter) 117 Reimann, Brigitte 74, 77–8 Franziska Linkerhand 77

Index

reliefs and structural elements 116–17, 118f Renau, Josep 34, 145–54 Beherrschung der Kräfte der Natur, Die (The Mastery of Nature) 150, 151pl–2pl, 153 Beziehung des Menschen zu Natur und Technik, Die (The Relationship of People to Nature and Technology) 2, 154 Einheit der Arbeiterklasse und die Gründung der DDR, Die (The Unity of the Working Class and the Foundation of the GDR) 150 ‘friedliche Nutzung der Atomenergie, Die’, The Peaceful Use of Atomic Energy 147pl Palast der Republik, Berlin 153–4 Technology Centre, Berlin-Wuhlheide 147 Ungebändiges Natur (Untamed Nature) 150 VEB Energy Building 147f Renner, Paul 160 restoration 1–2 Richter, Reginald 121 Richter, Reginald/Wilhelm, Richard O. Gläserne Blume (Glass Flower) 121 Ringbebauung, Leipzig 55 Rivera, Diego 33, 42 Detroit Industry 42 Popular History of Mexico, A 138 Rix, Dieter 147 Robbel, Kurt Hafenszene (Harbour Scene) 66, 67pl Rodenburg, Hans 133 Rolf, Walter Principles for Socialist Urbanism and Architecture’ 186 Rosenberg, Harold 33 Roßplatz, Leipzig 52 Rost, Otto 60 Rostock 185 brick patterning 188–91 community arts 191, 193pl Fünfgiebelhaus (Five Giebel House) 185 historical themes 187 Lebensfreude (Joy of Life) fountain (Dietrich, Reinhard/Jastram, Jo) 185–6f

231

maritime themes 187 Rostock-Evershagen 189, 191–2 Rostock-Schmarl 187–95 science themes 191 Rundfunkgebaude (Radio Building), Berlin-Adlershof 146–7 Rupp, Ferdinand 72–3 Sandberg, Herbert 147–8 Schaar, Gertraud Post Verbindet Städte, Länder und Kontinenten, Die (The Post Connects Towns, Countries and Continents) 126 Schade, Elfriede 92 Schade, Siegfried 92 Scheffel, Werner 58, 62 Schiefelbein, Hubert 12, 92 Schildkröte (Tortoise) (Leibe, Otto) 117 Schlesier, Karlheinz 108 Schmarl 187–95 Schmidt, Hans 82–90, 91, 97, 132, 202 Berlin 118 n.46 colour 94–5 ‘Colour in Architecture and Urbanism’ 94 ornament 92 Schmidt, Helene 212 Schmidt, Martin 212 Schmied, Wilhelm 119, 129, 131 Schneid, Wilhelm 118 Schonfeld, Martin 43 Schönfelder, Baldur Moon Station 122, 130f Schötschel-Gabriel 122 Schulze, Harry 120 Schwimmerin, Die (The Swimmer) (Fitzenreiter, William) 111 science 101 as subject 129–31, 191 scientific-technical revolution 6–7, 17 Sebald, W. G. 31 Second World Urbanity project 18 Second World War 31 SED (Socialist Unity Party) First Cultural Conference 44f Sedlmayr, Hans Verlust der Mitte (Loss of the Centre) 38 Seghers, Anna 42

232

Index

Sell, Lothar 185 Selmanagic´, Selman 63, 66–7 semiotics 19–20, 91, 169, 170 Senezh studio 18–19 Serielles Betonformsteinsystem (Modular Concrete Form System) (Adler, Karl-Heinz/Kracht, Friedrich) 92f seventh Plenum of the Building Academy 95 seventh ZAG seminar, Dresden 174 Sieg der Liebe über die Finsternis (Victory of Love over Darkness) (Enge, Erich) 153 Sieger, Brigitte 211 Sieger, Kurt Heinz 72, 73 Eisenhüttenstadt 75f Hoyerswerda balconies 74f Sikora, Bernd 198 Sindermann, Horst 108–9 Siqueiros, David Alfaro 33, 153 sister arts 51, 67 Sitte, Rudolf 120, 128 Sitte, Willi 1, 101–2, 124, 127, 205 ‘Freiheit der sozialistischen Persönlichkeit’ 142 ‘Freundschaft’ (Friendship) 126f Ikarus 124 Kulturhalle (cultural centre), HalleNeustadt 141f–2f research and development 128 Sixteen Principles of Urbanism 48–9, 50 social class 40 klassovost 58 social imaginary 5 socialist imaginary 5, 101, 203, 204 social sciences 98 socialism 169, 194, 195–7, 201–4 see also Halle-Neustadt Ackermann, Anton 35 beauty 96 failure 204 Flierl, Bruno 133–4, 196 Honecker, Erich 169 pleasure 178 Schmidt, Hans 87 visual representations 203 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) 169, 170, 171 youth, the 171

socialist, defining 16–21 Socialist Aesthetics (Köhring, Alexandra/ Rüthers, Monica) 17 socialist city, the 18 socialist difference 3 socialist motifs 55 socialist realism 3–5, 7, 9, 20, 47, 201–2 see also socialist unrealism artistic questions 97 artists attacking 102 Cold War 46 colour 93–4 communal values 128–9 Cremer, Fritz 102 defining 45 Groys, Boris 19 Gysi, Klaus 134–5 Hager, Kurt 134 Heisig, Bernhard 15 Kurella, Alfred 102 Letsch, Herbert 88–9 murals 33–4 obrazy 52 Soviet 45, 50–1 theory conferences, Bauakademie 83–8 Zhdanov, Andrei 32 Zhdanovist 32, 40 socialist unrealism 179 society 185, 203 Song of Life (Gilles, Sighard) 141 Sorbs, the 72, 94 sots art 19 Soviet Military Administration (SMAD) 34, 35 Soviet occupation 34–7 Soviet Union 14 aesthetic programme 48 Modernism 17 Palace of the Soviets, Moscow 51 reform 197 Senezh studio 18–19 sister arts 51 socialist realism 45, 50–1 sots art 19 technology 101 Soviet Writers Congress 32 spatial relations 143–5 see also public space Spektral Analyse (Spectral Analysis) (Glöckner, Hermann) 62

Index

Spielelefant (Play Elephant) (Leibe, Otto) 117 Sport (Stützer, Werner) 112 Stackpole, Ralph Industries of California 42 Stadtgeschichte Dresdens (Story of the City of Dresden) (Langner, Reinhold) 59 Stalinallee, Berlin. See Karl Marx Allee, Berlin Stalinstadt 50, 67–9 see also Eisenhüttenstadt standardized architecture 4, 56–8, 85–6, 201, 202 see also Halle-Neustadt and industrialized building Hoyerswerda 69–78 monotony 48, 77, 109, 127, 191 Stark, Martina ‘Die Biologin’ (The Biologist) 127f status reversal 167–8 Staufenbiel, Fred 98, 172, 202 Steinbrück, Karl-Heinz 72 Hoyerswerda balconies 76f Strempel, Horst 4 Nacht über Deutschland (Night over Germany) 41 Trümmer Weg, Baut Auf! (Clear the Rubble, Rebuild!) 41 Stürmer-Alex, Erika 181–2 ‘Fisch’, Fish 181pl ‘Vögelfrau’, Bird Woman 181pl Stützer, Werner Sport 112 Sukrow, Oliver 13 synthesis 56–7, 91, 103, 104, 133 synthetics 119–20 Tänzerin, Die (The Dancer) (Woyski, Jürgen von) 73 tapestry 124, 126 Taubenflug (Flight of Doves) (Hilscher, Rudolf) 112, 113 Technische Hochschule (TH; Technical College), Dresden 58–9 technology 101 cinema 143–4 colour 163 murals 120 scientific-technical revolution 6–7, 17 Technology Centre, Berlin-Wuhlheide 147

233

terminology 6, 14 Terrazas, Eduardo 170 textile art 124, 126 theory conference Bauakademie (1959) 83–7, 96 theory conference Bauakademie (1960) 87–8, 96 Thiele, Alfred 55 Thiele, Gisela 55 ‘300 Jahre Eisenhüttenwerk’, 300 Years of the Steel Works (Neubert, Willi) 121pl Tomski, Nikolai 136 Total Art of Stalinism, The (Groys, Boris) 14 tradition 201 ethnic 72 national 47–9, 52–5, 57, 185, 201 Rostock 187 Trauende (Grieving Woman) (Kollwitz, Käthe/Kreßner, Magdalene) 37 Triebsch, Hans-Joachim Hallesche Szene (Halle Scene) 182, 183pl, 184pl ‘Triumph des Todes, Triumph des Lebens’, Triumph of Death, Triumph of Life (Paris, Ronald) 193pl trompe l’oeil, Warschauer Strasse, Berlin (Brandt, Lutz) 175 Trümmer Weg, Baut Auf! (Clear the Rubble, Rebuild!) (Strempel, Horst) 41 Tschierschky, Siegfried 12, 91, 92, 93–4, 116 Turner, Victor 167, 168, 171 typichnost (typical situations) 57, 66 typographic design 118–19f, 122, 160 Ulbricht, Walter 7, 9, 46, 99–100 death 168 Flierl, Bruno 195 Mexican murals 153 realism 105 Stalinstadt 50 Umseidler, Heimkehrer (Resettlers, Homecomers) (Heller, Bert) 41 Umwelt (environment) 18 UN building, New York 50

234

Ungebändiges Natur (Untamed Nature) (Renau, Josep) 150 unreal, the 179–82, 191 Unser Leben (Our Life), Haus des Lehrers (House of Teachers) frieze (Womacka, Walter) 7–9f, 67, 69 Unser Neues Leben (Our New Life) (Womacka, Walter) 67, 68pl Urban, Florian Neo-historical East Berlin 21 urban development 17–18 Reimann, Brigitte 77–8 urban planning 48–50, 122–4, 195–6 art 88, 96 Bondzin, Gerhard 135–6 Ulbricht, Walter 99–100 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) 172 USA 31 Modernism 36, 45–6 realism 32–3 UN building, New York 50 V. Milan Triennale 34 vandalism 1 n.1 Vater und Sohn (Father and Son) (Hilscher, Rudolf) 111–12 VBKD/VBK-DDR (Verband Bildender Künstler) 22 Artists’ Congress (1970) 134–6 fifth Artists’ Union congress (1964) 102 ‘New Synthesis of the Arts, A’ memorandum 127–8 seminar (1965) 104–5 seminar (1979) 193–4 VEB Energy Building, Halle-Neustadt 147f Verlust der Mitte (Loss of the Centre) (Sedlmayr, Hans) 38 ‘Vier Wissenschaftler aus vier Jahrhunderten (Four Scientists from Four Centuries) (Geyer, Gerhard) 129f visual analysis 26–7 ‘Vögelfrau’, Bird Woman (Stürmer-Alex, Erika) 181pl Völkerfreundschaft (Friendship of the People) (Bebernis, Heinz) 111

Index

Volkerkundemuseum (Anthropology Museum)/Grassi Museum, Wilhelm Leuschner Platz, Leipzig 52, 53f Vollmert, Manfred 72, 115–16, 212 Brunnenplastik (fountain sculpture) 115, 116f Vom Sozialistischen Realismus zur Kunst im Sozialismus (Goeschen, Ulrike) 14 Wagner, Johannes Kinder und Ihre Umwelt (Children and their Environment) 112 Walter, Rolf 158, 160, 164, 205, 212 Marzahn 172, 173–4 Wandbild (mural) 6 Wände der Verheissung (Walls of Promises) (Guth, Peter) 12, 197–8 ‘Water’ (Dietrich, Reinhard) 189 Weg der Roten Fahne, Der (The Path of the Red Flag) (Bondzin, Gert) 1, 2f, 3f, 120, 128 Weidner, Klaus 102 Weissensee Kunsthochschule Berlin (Art School Berlin) 22 Wendepunkt (Turning Point) (Mohr, Arno) 66pl Western influence 161, 163, 204 Wetzel, Martin Alchemistenbrunnen (Alchemists’ Fountain) 131 Junges Paar (Young Pair) 112 Wilhelm, Richard O./Richter, Reginald Gläserne Blume (Glass Flower) 121 Wirth, Leonie 113, 115 ‘Glasbrunnen’ (Glass Fountain) 115f Pusteblumen (Dandelions) 113, 114f ‘Wissenschaft erobern, Die’ (Conquer Science) (Womacka, Walter) 130f ‘Wissenschaftler und Künstler’ (Scientists and Artists) (Lachnit, Max) 63f Wissenschaftswürfel (Science Cube) (Geyer, Gerhard) 129 Wittig, Rudolf 60 ‘Elementare Erscheinungen der Physik’ 61 Wittkügel, Klaus 118–19 Balkan Car Podom advertising 119 Café Moskau 119 LKW Tatra Motokov advertising 119pl

Index

Womacka, Walter 12, 22, 67, 102 ‘Gemeinschaftsarbeit der sozialistischen Länder’, Collective Work of Socialist Countries 69pl, 70pl, 138 Mexican murals 153 staircase windows, Kindergarten II, Living Complex II, Eisenhüttenstadt 69 Unser Leben (Our Life), Haus des Lehrers (House of Teachers) frieze 7–9f, 67, 69 Unser Neues Leben (Our New Life) 67, 68pl ‘Wissenschaft erobern, Die’ (Conquer Science) 130f X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) 158, 160–1, 172 women 23–4, 37–8, 55, 126 nudes 139 wood 73, 112, 121 working class, the 40 as subjects 42–4, 52, 54f ‘Working Collective of Socialist Artists’ (Berlin) 41 World Expo (1937) 34 ‘World of Children and Youth’ (Jastram, Jo/Büttner, Felix) 191 ‘World of Prettiness, A’ (Heller, Leonid) 132 Woyski, Jürgen von 64, 72, 73, 117 Hochschule für Bildende und Angewandte Kunst ceramic reliefs 64f, 65f ‘Kinderreigen’ (Children’s Ring-a-Ring of Roses) 65f Tänzerin, Die (The Dancer) 73 X. Weltfestspiele (10th World Festival Games) 157–69, 174, 204 behaviour during 165, 166f–8 emblem 159pl

235

evaluation 169–72 flag tower 161, 162pl global awareness during 165 identity 163, 164 influence on Marzahn 172–5 liminality 167–8, 170 Merkel, Ina 171 openness 169–70 pleasure 177 post-liminal phase 170–1 posters 160pl, 161pl public discussions 164–5 socialism 169, 170, 171 state control 165, 167 status reversal 167–8 Western influence 161, 163 youth, the 165, 170, 171 youth, the 165, 170, 171 youth clubs 182 Youth Law (1974) 171 ZAG (Central Working Group of Art and Architecture) 26, 87 last seminar, Rostock 198 seminar on colour (1979), Gera 194, 197 seventh ZAG seminar, Dresden 174 thirteenth seminar, Erfurt 195–7 X. Congress (1988) 198 ‘Zahlengiebel’, Number Wall (Jastram, Inge) 189, 190pl Zarecor, Kimberly 18 Zhdanov, Andrei 32, 57 Zhdanovist 32, 40 Ziegenreiterin (Goat Rider) (Hadelich, Martin) 112 ‘Zierbrunnem’ (Ornamental Fountain) (Adler, Karl-Heinz/Kracht, Friedrich) 114f Zimmermann, Gert 196 Zimmermann, Peter 212

236

Plate 1 Walter Womacka, Eisenhüttenstadt, 1956/58

Plate 2 Arno Mohr, Berlin, 1956

Plate 3 As plate 1

Plate 4 Kurt Robbel, Berlin, 1956

Colour plate numbers refer to List of Plates on pages xi–xiii. Colour images are also reproduced in monochrome in the text with full titles.

Plate 5 Willi Neubert, Halle, 1964

9

Plate 6 Willi Neubert, Halle-Neustadt, 1966

Plate 7 Willi Neubert, Suhl, 1977

Plate 8 Willi Neubert, Thale, 1985

Plate 9 Ingrid Müller-Kuberski, Halle, 1961

Plate 10 Josep Renau, Halle, 1971

Plate 11 Josep Renau, Halle-Neustadt, 1974

Plate 12 As plate 11

Plate 13 As plate 14 Plate 15 As plate 17

Plate 14 Walter Womacka, Eisenhüttenstadt, 1965

Plate 17 Fritz Eisel (mural), Hoyerswerda,1984

Plate 16 As plate 17

Plate 18 Klaus Wittkugel, Berlin, 1965

Plate 19 Irmela and Martin Hadelich, Halle-Neustadt, 1968 Below: Plate 20 Ronald Paris, Schwedt, 1978

Plate 21 Axel Bertram, Berlin, 1973

Plate 22 Berlin, 1973

Plate 23 Lutz Brandt, Berlin, 1973

Plate 24 Axel Bertram, Berlin, 1973 Right: Plate 25 As plate 24

Plate 26 Peter Baumbach and Jürgen Deutler, Rostock-Schmarl, 1976/78

Plate 27 Inge Jastram, Rostock-Schmarl, 1976/77

Plate 28 Artists/residents, Rostock-Schmarl, 1978

Plate 29 Hans-Joachim Triebsch, Halle,1988 Below: Plate 30 As Plate 29 Bottom left: Plate 31 Erika Stürmer-Alex, Eisenhüttenstadt, 1985/87 Bottom centre: Plate 32 As Plate 25 Bottom right: Plate 33 Stefan Horota, Berlin, 1982