Previous Exhibitions:
Gunta Stolzl - Bauhhaus Master (see below)
October 2000
This collection of rugs shown in New York, San Francisco
and at the RIBA London has proved by its success the enduring power
of the BAHAUS
GUNTA STÖLZL - Bauhaus Master
|
FOREWORD
San Francisco, January 1995. My business partner Matthew Bourne
and I are taking Jack Lenor Larsen, celebrated designer and
founder of the textile firm of that name, on a private tour
of the latest collection of Christopher Farr rugs at the Agnes
Bourne showroom (now de sousa hughes).
Jack, straight out of the blue, suggests that we should make
rugs from the designs of Gunta Stölzl, the director of
textiles and weaving at the Bauhaus from 1925-1931 and the only
female member of the faculty; "… you're the right
people to do this", he says.
So commenced a journey back to where modern twentieth century
design first began and eventually a meeting with her two daughters,
Monika Stadler and Yael Aloni. We initially agreed
to produce two versions of one design from 1926, a flatweave
and a hand knotted rug for a retrospective of her work: Gunta
Stölzl Meisterin am Bauhaus, held at the Museum fur Kunst
in Hamburg in March 1998.
People responded very positively to the works, now scaled up
twenty times from the original artwork and seen as actual carpets
for the very first time. One of these is now in the Twentieth
Century Room at the newly built British Embassy in Moscow and
subsequent editions have been produced, two of which are included
in this exhibition.
The group of carpets and flatweaves you see here are an extension
of that initial collaboration.
Having looked extensively at the enormous breadth of Gunta Stölzl's
work, we feel, at the close
of this century, that her influence, acknowledged only by the
world of art, design and textiles, is very far reaching indeed.
Today we see Stölzl's legacy everywhere, proving the point
that the best design looks as if it has existed for ever.
For us and our weavers this has been a most exacting project
but also a privilege and a challenge. This exhibition is just
a small selection from Stölzl's body of work but we hope
a beautiful and memorable one.
Christopher Farr, Matthew Bourne
|
DEDICATION
Gunta Stölzl made many more carpet designs than she could
ever have carried out on her
hand loom at the Bauhaus, busy as she was as director of the
weaving workshop.
We, her daughters, remember her amazement when her designs were
acquired as "works of art" by various museums in the
1970's.
And today, almost seventy years after their creation on paper,
we watch these designs being turned into hand woven carpets
which will serve a function in private homes or public spaces,
the way our mother intended then to do.
We feel, Gunta Stölzl would have been happy to see this
come about: Christopher Farr, the English designer, falling
in love with her work, Jack Lenor Larsen (the number one American
weaver) giving advice, and Turkish weavers joining in with their
exceptional skills.
The carpets do justice to Gunta Stölzl's original intent:
they are strikingly beautiful and integrate easily into todays
interiors.
Yael Aloni, Monika Stadler
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Plate 174
|
Plate 175
|
Plate 108: 'Red Green'
|
Plate 124
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Plate 137
|
Plate 121
|
Plate 137a
|
Plate 208
|
AFTERWORD
How pleased I was, at the vernisage of my 1966 exhibition at
Zurich, to find a coterie of pre-war artists and designers including
Max Bill, but especially Gunta Stölzl, then still active
in her Zurich studio. As the Larsen international headquarters
were in Zurich and I there often, the two of us
had time to share the experience common to two custom handweavers.
As most of Gunta's Zurich commissions had been for functional,
muted upholstery cloths, I was able to select from their remnants
a collection of samples for New York's Museum of Modern Art.
Our greatest joy, however, was in feasting our eyes on her compositions
painted in glowing tempera for woven hangings and rugs. In spite
of their small format these were complexly asymmetrical works.
Almost always the colourings were mouthwatering, and as sunny,
as softly sophisticated Mughal miniatures. Here were tensions
between dominant and secondary shades, with other introductions
and refrains, with the extremes and bridges - all entirely in
keeping with her high-keyed tonalities and soft edged geometry.
Still, it was not until - decades later - when her daughter
brought me her original folios that I realised their present
day importance. For here, momentarily dormant, was an early
20th century art form both personal and appropriate. We spoke
of possibilities for exhibition, for publication, and - most
of all - woven realisation. But the rug weavers I knew were
too large or too commercial. Still later, when I was commissioned
by Larsen Carpet to realise with Tibetan weavers Anni Albers'
Bauhaus designs, it came to me that Gunta's compositions would
be best realised by Asian handweavers. Still, no solution came
until I found Christopher Farr's London galleries full of modern
kilims and handknotted rugs woven in Anatolia. Their glistening,
wiry fibre from sheep bred for millennia to produce the best
carpet wools added to their quality. So did kettle dyeing streaky
yarns handspun from ungraded fleeces.
All the organic richness was here, offset by the meticulous
craftsmanship found in antique rugs. And here, it seemed, were
the entrepreneurs one could trust with Stölzl's repertoire.
Right on! For here we have a design bank begun in the early
20th century, now timely and timeless for the 21st.
Jack Lenor Larsen
New York, October 7, 1999
|
|
|
|
Ground
Floor 6 Burnsall Street London SW3 3ST
•
Telephone +44 (0)20 7349 0888 • Fax +44 (0)20 7349 0088
|
|
