debauhaus1-9, Exercise 3: West and East

Model answer:

West Germany gradually embraced the Bauhaus as a model of democratic, modern design. The Bauhaus-Archiv was founded in 1960 (and later moved to Berlin), and the Ulm School of Design and the company Braun drew on its ideas (check the dates).

East Germany took a different line at first. In the early 1950s the Bauhaus was officially condemned as "formalist" and cosmopolitan, and the state favoured a style based on traditional forms, as in the Stalinallee in Berlin (check the policy and the examples). Later the attitude softened: the Dessau building was restored in the 1970s and reopened, and industrial design was supported by state design bodies (check the date and names).

Why the East's attitude changed: the early hostility reflected the cultural line of the time, which favoured traditional forms and treated modernism as suspect. Over the following decades, the state's own interest in industrial production, in international standing, and in presenting a heritage that included the Bauhaus (the school's buildings were on its territory) made a rehabilitation convenient, and design officials and teachers pressed for it (check the causes, which historians weigh differently).