Scholarly record

‘MORE THAN GOOD SHAPE’– BAUHAUS’ IDEAS IN POLISH AND EUROPEAN MUSIC

K. S. Stulka

Abstract

This year we celebrate centenary of BauhausВ’ school established by Walter Gropius and his team in Weimar in 1919. In my paper I consider the possible influence between Bauhaus ideas in visual arts and music of that time. The main streams in Bauhaus philosophy developed the new concept of art and based on the rules as follows: reduction of decoration, innovation, geometry in construction, form devoted from function, social impact of art. I was inspired by Bauhaus as an interdisciplinary field that concentrates on the interplay between various areas of art. It was also a specific combination of interinfluenced fields of activities of painters, architects, musicians and designers. For my topic I refer to the concept of modernity created by Walter Gropius, the idea of reduction developed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, functional architecture and design propagated by Hannes Meyer, coloured and geometrical abstraction inspired by Wasily Kandinsky and Paul Klee, integration of visual arts, theatre and music implemented by Oskar Schlemmer. My aim is to find, discover and study the influence of the above ideas on music of that time. I focus on the Middle European circle of music but also go further choosing some connections between Bauhaus and Polish modernity in the 20ties and 30ties of 20th century. As the topic of a theoretical view I choose some examples from music of leading composers in the time of Bauhaus such as Paul Hindemith (The Triadic Ballet), Igor Stravinsky (The SoldierВ’s Tale), Karol Szymanowski (Slopiewnie, Harnasie). I concentrate on the impulse of their modern compositions corresponding with BauhausВ’ ideas (how they find inspirations to their music) and reflected in their compositional process (what factors have the biggest impact on it). I will focus both on composers' statements about their creative process as well as on how is reflected in selected pieces. The compositional technique and inspirational ideas for compositions will be in the area of my interest. The methodological background for this paper is based on the studies devoted to Bauhaus concept of arts, musical references and composers studies.

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