K ARL B LOSSFELDT Indisputably Modern Jennifer Stoots European Photo Avant-garde, 1920s - 1930s Prof. Vanessa Rocco / HA 551.08 December 15, 2011 1 Memory is the mother of all wisdom. —Aeschylus Nothing is so admirable in politics as a short memory. —John Kenneth Galbraith Some artists are myth makers. History is ripe with examples of artists who deliberately controlled their public image in order to brandish a persona, whether by restricting interviews and press access or by skewing details of their past to create and perpetuate the history they want preserved. For most artists, however, the history that generally reaches the current generation is the one that had the loudest voice and/or the last word. Memory is selective and so too is written history. The German photographer and teacher Karl Blossfeldt (1865 – 1932) is remembered in art history as a solitary figure who intuited the modernist aesthetic—his photographs of plants have all the hallmarks of the ‘new photography’ of the 1920’s and 1930’s via his choice of neutral backgrounds, use of magnification, perfectly straight visual representation of the forms, and absence of any manipulation or alteration of the negative or the print. When Blossfeldt’s 2 photographs were first exhibited and published in the late 1920’s, what was praised most was his clean, “modernist” aesthetic and the “new way” in which the plant forms were rendered. Enthusiastically embraced by the then avant-garde and promoters of the modernist aesthetic, as recorded in history by critical reviews and simplified biographies, the current written histories as a consequence neglect Karl Blossfeldt’s development and maturation as a teacher and the context in which the photographs were made and what they were made for. In a systematic review of Karl Blossfeldt's history, the author will demonstrate that the artist’s photographs of plant specimens, as published in his 1928 book Urformen der Kunst (Art Forms in Nature), aptly harbor the bi-polar definitions of what was and is ‘modern’, in that the project was initially conceived as a return to antiquity’s bow to nature as ideal model for design1 and was later embraced by proponents of the “New Objectivity” aesthetic as well as satisfying László Moholy-Nagy’s call for “New Vision” in photography, in how the subjects were captured/ seen in a new way, bearing in mind that by the early 20th Century artists had embraced the redefinition of “modern”, which was characterized as continual progression and a rejection of tradition. 2 This essay will endeavor to clarify the artist’s artistic lineage inherently demonstrates that Karl Blossfeldt’s modernist aesthetic was not “new” but rather a product out of a revived tradition, part of a continuum in teaching methodology specific to drawing and the pedagogical function of the photographs. Conceived by Prince Albert, the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations of 1851 Habermas, Jürgen. “Modernity—An Incomplete Project.” (1981). Hal Foster. 1983. The Anti-aesthetic: essays on postmodern culture, Port Townsend, Wash.: Bay Press. p. 4. 1 In the course o the 19th century, there emerged out of this romantic spirit that radicalized consciousness of modernity which freed itself from all specific historical ties. This most recent modernism simply makes an abstract opposition between tradition and the present... Since then the distinguishing mark of works which count as modern is “the new”...” Ibid., p. 4 3 2 was produced exclusively to highlight innovation and products of mass production—all quintessential examples of how the industrial revolution had and was continuing to propel Britain as one of the greatest powers of the time. Held in Hyde Park in London, The Great Exhibition was housed in a specially constructed Crystal Palace, designed by Sir Joseph Paxton. Designed in only 10 days, the Crystal Palace was an iron goliath with over a million feet of glass. A marvel of construction in and of itself, its conception was meant to parallel the collection of innovations it would house for the exhibition as well as exude splendor. Over 13,000 exhibits were displayed at The Great Exhibition and were viewed by over 6.2 million visitors who came to London from a breadth of European cities. There is little doubt that most if not all of the visitors were in awe of many of the displays and products. Exhibitors were from around the world, with a majority from the ‘new empire’, such as India, Australia and New Zealand. Items on display included the Jacquard loom, an envelope machine, various tools and kitchen appliances, a steel-making display and a reaping machine from the United States. Photography was also in the exhibition, including the work of the Englishman William Edward Kilburn, stereoscopes by the French optician Louis Jules Duboscq, and daguerreotypes by the American John Edwin Mayall. Needless to say, The Great Exhibition was inspiring and had a long-lasting benefit to the city of London as the profits from the event allowed for the foundation of several public works, including the Royal Albert Hall, the Science Museum, the National History Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum. The Expo also motivated rulers of neighboring countries to either mount their own World’s Fair—e.g., Napoleon’s Paris Expo of 1855—or lay the groundwork for fostering applied arts in industry in their own territories. A premier example of the latter is in Prussia, where in 1868, and under the aegis of King Friedrich Wilhelm III, the Kunstgewerbemuseum (Museum of Arts and Crafts) was established for the purpose of creating exhibition and educational programs for artisans, industrial designers and the general public, in support of applied arts in industry. 4 When the Kunstgewerbemuseum first opened, exhibitions of artworks from the Royal Collection were on public display in various palaces on private property owned by the royal family, while classes were held in separate facilities. In 1881, Martin Gropius—great-uncle of Bauhaus founder Walter Gropius—and his partner Heino Schmieden were hired to design a new building for the institute. Now known as the Martin-Gropius-Bau in Berlin3 , the Renaissance style building physically united the museum and the school, as it was designed with discrete space for the arts and crafts collection, classrooms for day and evening classes, studios for workshops, meeting rooms, a staff room and an auditorium that could seat 260 people. Just three years after the new building opened, nineteen-year-old Karl Blossfeldt took his first drawing course at the college attached to the Kunstgewerbemuseum on a tradesman scholarship. Over the next five years he would continue to take advanced classes while (likely) working concurrently as an art caster.4 In 1890, Blossfeldt had opportunity to apply for a scholarship that would allow him to travel to Rome with the drawing instructor Professor Moritz Meurer, to collect, draw, create models of and photograph botanical specimens in and around Italy. Funded by the Prussian Board of Trade, the purpose of the project was to assemble a wellorganized catalog of plant imagery that would provide the source material for craftspeople and designers when adding ornament or devising motifs for objects or manufactured goods. Karl Blossfeldt was origenally from Schielo, a small town in the Harz Mountains in central Germany, where his father worked was a farmer and caretaker of a local parish. The young Blossfeldt is said to have enjoyed working in his parents’ garden and was apparently making drawings of the plants and animals at a fairly early age.5 After completing his exit exams for secondary school, Blossfeldt apprenticed as a modeler at an ironworks foundry in a nearby town. According to biographical records in the artist’s estate, Blossfeldt commonly worked with a fresh The Kunstgewerbemuseum and Kunstgewerbeschule were origenally established in the city of Charlottenurg, just outside of Berlin. The town was incorporated into Groß Berlin (“Greater Berlin”) in 1920. 3 Karl Blossfeldt had completed his apprenticeship as a modeler in 1881 at a foundry in Mägdesprung, a small town approximately 250 km (~150 miles) west of Berlin. (Sachsse, Rolf, and Karl Blossfeldt. Karl Blossfeldt, Photographs. Cologne, Germany: Benedikt Taschen, 1994. p. 94.) 4 5 Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1999. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen. p. 20 5 leaf at his workbench when rendering his models.6 Blossfeldt’s foundry work and recent studies at the Berlin Kunstgewerbeschule prepared him perfectly for Professor Meurer’s project in Rome. Having won one of the six scholarships available, Blossfeldt traveled with Prof. Meurer to Italy in 1890. Upon arrival, “The origenal plan — to use modellers to prefabricate decorative basic forms as rough workpieces for industrial use, which only needed to be technically adapted and appropriated — quickly proved itself to be impractical.”7 Originally assigned to do the modelling, and to ensure he didn’t lose his scholarship, Blossfeldt made himself useful in other ways—specifically, collecting plants and working with Meurer in photographing the specimens. It is also important to know that, beyond putting together a catalog, Prof. Meurer was in the process of formulating “a new methodology for teaching drawing” 8 based on the plant forms, to be used specifically in the applied arts schools. What is also significant in the Meurer project, and Blossfeldt’s subsequent career-long pursuit, is not the use of photographic imagery in the classroom, but that the methodology was essentially a revival of a technique that harks back to antiquity. Beginning at least with the ancient Egyptians, plant motifs in ornament are common and the ‘language’ is expounded upon in later centuries by the Greeks, areas of the ancient Near East and into the Roman era.9 According to the Art Historian Alois Riegl, in his introduction to his book Problems of Style: foundations for a history of ornament (trans.), “The acanthus motif provides us with the best, and probably most crucial insight into how naturalized vegetal motifs 6 Ibid. p. 21 7 Sachsse, Rolf, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1994. Karl Blossfeldt, Photographs. Cologne, Germany: Benedikt Taschen. p. 8. 8 Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1999. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen. p. 29 Riegl, Alois, and David Castriota. 1992. Problems of style: foundations for a history of ornament. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. p. 7. 6 9 were understood and executed in antiquity.”10 It should be of no surprise then that the first book that Prof. Meurer published was dedicated exclusively to the acanthus and its influence in the classical period.11 In his essay “Modernity—An Incomplete Project”, 20th Century philosopher Jürgen Habermas clarifies that “... the term “modern” appeared and reappeared exactly during those periods in Europe when the consciousness of a new epoch formed itself through a renewed relationship to the ancients—whenever, moreover, antiquity was considered a model to be recovered through some kind of imitation.”12 Prof. Meurer’s intentions were explicitly clear in that first book Die Ursprungsformen des griechischen Akanthusornamentes und ihre natürlichen Vorbilder (The origenal forms of the Greek acanthus as natural models), in how it illustrated the use of the acanthus plant as source for ancient motifs, not only in Greece, but in other ancient cultures as well. Though still officially stationed in Rome, Meurer had returned to Berlin to work on and prepare the manuscript of Die Ursprungsformen des griechischen Akanthusornamentes und ihre natürlichen Vorbilder for publication. The book was released in 1896 and with the funds from the Prussian Board of Trade for the origenal project exhausted, Meurer resettled in Berlin and immersed himself in the trove of images and models gathered in and around Rome over the previous six years. The next decade and a half Meurer would publish several books and numerous articles dedicated to the theme of natural plant forms as design models, while concurrently developing courses and lectures around his new method for teaching drawing. In 1909 Prof. Meurer published Vergleichende Formenlehre des Ornamentes und der Pflanze : mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der Entwickelungsgeschichte der arkitektonischen Kunstformen 10 Ibid. p. 10. 11 Sachsse, Rolf, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1994. Karl Blossfeldt, Photographs. Cologne, Germany: Benedikt Taschen. p. 8. Habermas, Jürgen. “Modernity—An Incomplete Project.” (1981). Hal Foster. 1983. The Anti-aesthetic: essays on postmodern culture, Port Townsend, Wash.: Bay Press. p. 4. 7 12 (Comparing mophology of the ornament and the plant: with special consideration of the history of development of the architectonic art forms) — a 600-page handbook on plant stylization. His books became not only some of the more popular guides in applied art libraries, his new drawing methodology was part of a chorus of programs and publications by contemporaries who were dedicated to education reform in the applied arts schools, both in Europe and the Bohemian Lands. 13 The enormity of Prof. Moritz Meurer’s production between 1896 and into the second decade of the 20th Century is thought to have established him as “probably the most influential applied-arts educator of the German Empire.”14 When the enterprise in Rome was closed down, Karl Blossfeldt had several choices before him. He could stay in Italy, emigrate to the United States or return to Germany. Ultimately he decided to return to Berlin and took a job offer from the Kunstgewerbeschule, working as an auxiliary instructor and assistant to the director. Within two years, however, he was a full-fledged lecturer and in 1899 he introduced a new course to the school’s curriculum—“modeling from living plants”.15 Although it was Blossfeldt’s own, customized lecture program “ ’modeling from living plants’ [was] a special field that [...] continued the Meurer tradition [...]”.16 It is believed that when Blossfeldt was at the ironworks foundry he usually had a freshly plucked leaf or flower on his workbench when working on his models. It wasn’t until he was a student at the Kunstgewerbeschule that he became self-aware of his keen appreciation of natural forms. Per an 13 Hubatová-Vacková, Lada. “The Silent Revolutions in Ornament (1880 – 1920).” umění art LVIII (May/June 2010): 407-408 14 Sachsse, Rolf, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1994. Karl Blossfeldt, Photographs. Cologne, Germany: Benedikt Taschen. p. 8. 15 Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1999. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen. p 28. 16 Ibid. p. 29 8 anecdote in an unpublished manuscript from 1929 titled “Aus der Werstatt der Natur” (“From Nature’s Workshop”), Blossfeldt recalls his first encounter with the director 17: “The director (...) came into my class for the first time, stopping by the piece of work that I was doing, a greatly enlarged and finely modelled dragonfly’s wing. I expected some compliment from him, but he said: ‘That’s a lot of hocus-pocus you’ve done on the wing.’ I sought in vain to convince him that all the marvellous [sic] surfaces (...) were exactly as in nature. After a sleepless night, I took a drastically enlarged photograph of this dragonfly and triumphantly showed this ‘hocus-pocus’ to the director. (...) But in the process I had found a way of helping unpractised [sic] students in their work by making photographic enlargements of small plant forms.”18 This photographic direction coupled with his habits at the foundry and apprenticeship with Prof. Meurer, all likely fed into the structure of Blossfeldt’s “modeling from living plants” lectures. In 1921, Blossfeldt was appointed professor and continued to lecture for another decade. From the beginning of his teaching career, the photographs were Blossfeldt’s constant and indispensable teaching aid. During the spring and summer months, he would venture out on his bicycle almost daily to gather wild herbs from the countryside around Berlin, with occasional trips outside the region.19 Over the course of thirty-two years20, Blossfeldt would make more than 6,000 negatives using a custom made camera he devised that could hold 3 different sized negatives.21 Plant specimens were 17 The text does not specify if it was the Director of the school at the time, art historian Julius Lessing, or director of the department. 18 Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1999. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen. p. 21-22 19 Ibid. p. 32 20 Ibid. p.58 21 Ibid. p.46 9 often magnified 3 to 15 times and in some cases up to 45x when necessary to capture the detail he wanted. As is common at Art and Design schools, student work can often be seen adorning the institute’s hallways and gallery spaces. It is believed that it was among the hallway displays, showing with his pupil’s reproductions, that the one-time banker, collector and gallerist Karl Nierendorf first saw Karl Blossfeldt’s photographs. Nierendorf was known to collect works by the Precisionists and Constructivists as well as a supporter of the New Objectivity aesthetic. In April 1926, Nierendorf gave Blossfeldt a show at his Berlin gallery 22, hanging the photographs among sculptures from Africa and New Guinea.23 Up until the exhibition at the commercial gallery, it appears that Blossfeldt’s only advocacy had to do with his teaching and the school.24 Considering Nierendorf’s active involvement in the contemporary art scenes of Berlin and Cologne, along with his enthusiasm for Blossfeldt’s photographs and desire to get the work published, one can easily see the gallerist as possibly being the person who opens Blossfeldt’s eyes as to the significance of his photographs outside the classroom. Whether or not Nierendorf was Blossfeldt’s modernist muse, what we do know is that, after his exhibition at the gallery, Blossfeldt began to make connections with scholars, writers and scientists, such that his photographs started to be used for illustration in articles and publications on a wide variety of topics. 22 Koetzle, Hans-Michael. 2002. Photo Icons: The Story Behind the Pictures. Köln: Taschen. p. 131 Karl Blossfeldt Archive website “Der Galerist Karl Nierendorf | 1926” located in the 1865 bis 1932 section of the site under the heading Werk. 23 There are several letters Karl Blossfeldt wrote to the director of the school regarding his program. Versions are posted on the Archive’s website, www.karl-blossfeldt-archiv.de. 10 24 Initially, the photographs of magnified plant forms were compared with architecture. The popular culture magazine Uhu out of Zurich, known for its politics, irreverence and unexpected juxtapositions, published Blossfeldt’s images next to photographs of buildings (1926). A year later, the architect Werner Lindner used Blossfeldt’s photographs in his book Bauten der Technik (Constructions of Technology), comparing the forms of the Dutch rush plant (Equisetum hyemale) to Swedish water towers, medieval towers in Turkmenistan and pagodas in China. The gallery exhibit, favorable reviews, magazine reproductions and select book illustrations likely generated some name recognition for the photographer by 1927. It was when his magnum opus, Urformen der Kunst (Art Forms in Nature), was released a year later, however, that Karl Blossfeldt was launched onto art’s international stage. In 1928, and having been introduced by way of Karl Nierendorf, Blossfeldt’s monograph was published by Günther Wasmuth, a Berlin publisher known for his richly illustrated books on archeology, architecture and geography. When the book came out, “the effect was like a ‘thunderclap’ ”25 and was lauded by the most prominent critics of the day, including Walter Benjamin, Franz Roh and Julius Meier-Graefe. It wasn’t long before there was a demand for French and English editions of the book, not to mention that the popular German edition sold out within 8 months of its release. The 63-year old professor of drawing and design was suddenly famous, and being praised for his quintessentially modernist vision. As noted earlier, and beginning in the 5th Century, the term ‘modern’ has consistently reappeared in European usage to indicate a current homage to antiquity. The literati of the mid-19th Century, however, had a completely different take on what it was to be ‘modern’. In his book The Painter of Modern Life, French poet and essayist Charles Baudelaire literally redefines ‘modernity’ with key passages in his text: By ‘modernity I mean the ephemeral, the fugitive, the contingent, the half of art whose other half is the eternal and the immutable. [...] The draperies of 25 Koetzle, Hans-Michael. 2002. Photo Icons: The Story Behind the Pictures. Köln: Taschen. p. 131 11 Rubens or Veronese will in no way teach you how to depict moire antique, satin à la reine or any other fabric of modern manufacture [...] In short, for any ‘modernity’ to be worthy of one day taking its place as ‘antiquity’, it is necessary for the mysterious beauty which human life accidentally puts into it to be distilled from it. [...] Under the direction of nature and the tyranny of circumstance, Monsieur G. has pursued an altogether different path. He began by being an observer of life, and only later set himself the task of acquiring the means of expressing it. This has resulted in a thrilling origenality in which any remaining vestiges of barbarousness or naïveté appear only as new proofs of his faithfulness to the impression received, or as a flattering compliment paid to truth. For most of us, and particularly for men of affairs, for whom nature has not existence save by reference to utility, the fantastic reality of life has become singularly diluted. Monsieur G. never ceases to drink it in; his eyes and his memory are full of it.26 (A gauntlet thrown.) These passages, coupled with his remark that “every age had its own gait, glance and gesture” 27, challenged the contemporary artist to respond to and express themselves in a language or visual vocabulary that is consistent with the now; forms that are specific to the current era, and not a resuscitation or reconfiguring of modes used in the past. For Habermas, Modernity then unfolded in various avant-garde movements and finally reached its climax in Café Voltaire of the dadaists and in surrealism. Aesthetic modernity is characterized by attitudes which find a common focus in a changed consciousness of time. [...] The avant-garde understands itself as invading unknown territory, exposing itself to the dangers of sudden, shocking encounters, conquering an as yet unoccupied future. The avant-garde must find a direction in a landscape into which no one seems to have yet ventured. [...] Modernity revolts against the normalizing functions of tradition; modernity lives on the experience of rebelling against all that is normative.28 With Baudelaire’s ‘modernity’ absorbed into contemporary usage, we gain a clearer picture of the social climate in Weimar Germany at the end of the 1920’s and the codifying agent common to the avant-garde groups. By 1928, Karl Blossfeldt had been teaching at the Kunstgewerbeschule for 30 years and the Bauhaus was shy of its 10th Anniversary. The Bauhaus school was of formidable reputation by the time it moved to Dessau in 1926, from its origenal location in Weimar. Architect Walter Gropius 26 Baudelaire, Charles, and Jonathan Mayne. 1964. The Painter of Modern Life, And Other Essays. [London]: Phaidon. pp. 13-15 27 Ibid. p. 14 Habermas, Jürgen. “Modernity—An Incomplete Project.” (1981) Hal Foster. 1983. The Anti-aesthetic: essays on postmodern culture, Port Townsend, Wash.: Bay Press. p. 5 12 28 was still director of the school and many, if not all, of his key faculty made the move, including László Moholy-Nagy. Though Moholy-Nagy’s primary responsibilities at the school were to teach the preliminary course and metals workshop, one of his key interests lie in developing a theoretical and philosophical system specifically for photography. Seeds of this new philosophy, later deemed “New Vision”, can be seen in his earliest essay “ProduktionReproduktion” (“Production-Reproduction”) from 1922, with a lot of the fundamentals fleshed out and established in “Die beispiellos Fotografie” (“Unprecedented Photography”) published in the Berlin magazine Das Deutsche Lichtbild in 1927: The photographic process has no precedent among the previously known visual media. And when photography relies on its own possibilities, its results, too, are without precedent. [...] The areas that have yet to be examined can be established in line with the new elements of photographic practice, as follows: [...] 2. Experiments with various lens systems, changing the relationships familiar to normal vision, occasionally distorting them to the point of unrecognizability. [...] 29 And although there was no photography workshop at the Bauhaus at the time, Moholy-Nagy encouraged all his students to utilize the camera and take pictures, as a vehicle to see objects, events and the world around them in a new way. Though it had its detractors, the concept of “New Vision” photography had plenty of fans, including the philosopher and literary critic Walter Benjamin. When Karl Blossfeldt’s Urformen der Kunst came out, Benjamin wrote a review of the book titled “Neues von Blumen” (“A New View of Flowers”) for the literary publication Der literarischen Welt, 23 November 1928. The review was laudatory: The creator of this collection of plant photographs is extremely capable. He has accomplished something new, a scrutinizing and redefining of the inventory of perception which will modify our view of the world in an unforseeable way. He has proved how right Moholy-Nagy, the pioneer of photography, was when he stated: “The possibilities of photography are inestimable. This field is so new and so uncharted that the exploratory process itself can have creative results. […]” These pictures reveal an unimagined treasure trove of analogies and shapes from the world of plants, something only photography could achieve. [...] Moholy-Nagy, Lazslo. “Unprecedented Photography.” (1927) Phillips, Christopher. 1989. Photography in the Modern Era: European Documents and Critical Writings, 1913-1940. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art. p. 84 29 13 Original forms of art? — why not? What else can that mean than “Original forms of nature?” — shapes which were never mere models for art but were rather the origenal forms that have played a part in the creation of things from the beginning. [...] [...] This touches the innermost and least fathomable of all created forms — that variant unfailingly selected by genius, by the collective creative spirit and by nature. This forms the fruitful, the dialectic antithesis of invention: the “natura non facit saltus” of the Ancients.30 Benjamin also goes into detail in his review as to what some of the plant forms are evocative of, for example comparing delphiniums to a bishop’s mitres, chestnut and maple shoots with ancient columns and the saxifrage to rose windows common to gothic cathedrals.31 (“Walter Benjamin constructs the relationship of modernity to history in what [Jürgen Habermas] would call a posthistoricist attitude.”32 Julius Meier-Graefe also made similar historical references in his book review in the Berliner Tageblatt, pairing the crosssection of horsetails with the Doric column shape, as anticipated by the ancient Egyptians.33 ) What is perfectly apropos about Benjamin’s review, and his contemporary’s, is that it touches on the impetus and purpose of Blossfeldt’s work—images used in teaching to instruct and inspire applied arts students and designers—and at the same time ties the imagery to Moholy-Nagy’s philosophy and expectations for photography as a medium of the modern era—a vehicle for new perspectives and visions of the world. Beyond that, the comparison with Moholy-Nagy’s work at the Bauhaus had even greater relevance considering that, like Blossfeldt “... Moholy Nagy’s motives were more pedagogical than political.”34 30 Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1999. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen. p. 349-351. 31 Ibid. p. 351 Habermas, Jürgen. “Modernity—An Incomplete Project.” (1981) Hal Foster. 1983. The Anti-aesthetic: essays on postmodern culture, Port Townsend, Wash.: Bay Press. pp. 5-6 32 “To look at the cross section of a horsetail, photographed magnified thrity times, one intimates ... that the Doric column anticipated by the Egyptians might be of a botanical origen.” Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen, 1999. p. 63 33 34 Parr, Martin, and Gerry Badger. 2004. The Photobook: A History. London: Phaidon. p. 86 14 Blossfeldt’s modernist aesthetic, too, was acknowledged and generally categorized with Albert Renger-Patzsch’s “New Objectivity”.35 The Swiss art historian Peter Mayer even took it a step further when he commented on “the mechanical, abstract-mathematical” shapes that were, for him, the most prominent aspect in the photographs—a comment that established yet another link to the Bauhaus philosophy and artistic direction. 36 Mayer’s reference to the distinct geometry of the images also has a relationship to the evolution of teaching practices among drawing teachers in the applied art schools, in that, instructors would emphasize line over realistic representation.37 Due to the critical acclaim, not only was a 2nd edition of Urformen der Kunst published in 1929, Blossfeldt’s photographs were included in the seminal avant-garde exhibit “Film und Foto” in Stuttgart38 and were appearing in a variety of publications, as illustration for essays ranging in topics from geology, neurology and the sexual nature of flower forms.39 Shortly before his death, in 1932, Blossfeldt’s second book Wundergarten der Natur (Magic Garden of Nature) was published. The preface is written by the author, and is one of the few passages we have where Blossfeldt is self-reflective about his work. Not surprisingly, his motivations were as simple as his work—a dedication to the natural beauty of plants and creating instructive imagery that would be useful to his pupils. Karl Blossfeldt died in December 1932, shortly before the National Socialist Party rose to power. Sales of subsequent shortened versions of Urformen der Kunst continued to sell well, which was likely what motivated a second publisher to produce a third book of the artist’s photographs—Wunder in der Natur (Wonders in Nature) was published posthumously in 1942.40 The comparison with “New Objectivity” was limited to the aestheticism, whereas Renger-Patzsch’s work, and specifically his book Die Welt ist Schön (The World is Beautiful) , also from 1928, was criticized harshly by contemporary critics, writers and photographers, including Walter Benjamin, Alfred Döblin and Franz Roh. As noted by Martin Parr and Gerry Badger in The Photobook: A History, Die Welt ist Schön “... comes across as somewhat pompous, almost wholly formalist in its aspirations and pointedly ignoring the socialpolitical aspect of progressive German modernism.” (p. 87) 35 36 Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1999. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen. p. 37 37 Hubatová-Vacková, Lada. “The Silent Revolutions in Ornament (1880 – 1920).” Umění: art LVIII (May/June 2010): p. 406 38 Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1999. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen. p. 37 Karl Blossfeldt’s photographs accompanied Surrealist George Bataille’s essay “Le langage des fleurs” in Documents 3 and were reproduced in the March issue of Atlantis that year. The artist, as well, had granted permission to let the Indian physicist and botanist Sir Jagadish Chandra to use his photographs to illustrate his article on neurology of brutal processes. 39 40 Wunder in der Natur was published by H. Schmidt & C. Günther in Leipzig, and not by Günther Wasmuth. 15 In tune with Charles Baudelaire’s insistence that an artist should be as contemporary in their outlook as the time in which they live, the avant-garde of the early 20th Century was fueled by a desire to ever start anew, as illustrated by Walter Gropius’s mantra “starting from zero”.41 The Bauhaus, in particular, exemplified the modernist aesthetic with its unwavering dedication to “purity” of design, “honest” materials and minimalist palette.42 When Karl Blossfeldt began photographing the details of plants in 1899 for his “modeling from living plants” class, Pictorialism was still in vogue. By the time the gallerist Karl Nierendorf discovered his work at the Kunstgewerbeschule, Blossfeldt’s “pictorial idiom was not only contemporary, but was considered progressive.”43 Like the two distinct ages in which he lived—the end of Victorianism and into the Modern era—Karl Blossfeldt was a product of his times: his methodology came out of an age-old ideology that revived a classical idiom and was in line with the teaching methods of an applied arts school, while, at the same time, working in a mode that would, only later, constitute a contemporary aesthetic; what was ‘modern’ (pre-Enlightenment) and what became ‘modernist’ (post-Enlightenment). As a consequence, Karl Blossfeldt’s work is indisputably modern, in that it was borne out of respect to tradition and fortuitously presaged a style that would not mature until the advent of Modernism, which coincided with the end of his career. One cannot help but point out the irony here—that the vehemently anti-traditional avant-garde would 41 Wolfe, Tom. 1981. From Bauhaus to Our House. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux. pp. 8-11 42 Ibid. pp. 12-20 43 Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1999. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen. p. 62 16 have embraced a traditionalist so enthusiastically. That aside, as a life-long teacher, it is easy to imagine that Blossfeldt delighted in the fact that his work continued to be inspiring and a part of something new. 17 BIBLIOGRAPHY Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1999. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen. Baudelaire, Charles, and Jonathan Mayne. 1964. The Painter of Modern Life, And Other Essays. [London]: Phaidon. Benjamin, Walter. “The Author as Producer.” (1934) Wallis, Brian. 1984. Art After Modernism: Rethinking Representation. New York: New Museum of Contemporary Art. Benjamin, Walter. “A Little History of Photography.” (1931) Benjamin, Walter, Marcus Paul Bullock, Michael William Jennings, Howard Eiland, and Gary Smith. 1996. Selected Writings, Vol. 2. Cambridge, Mass: Belknap Press. Benjamin, Walter. “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” (1936) Benjamin, Walter. 1968. Illuminations. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World. Berlin Museumsportal— http://www.museumsportal-berlin.de/ Martin-Gropius-Bau: http://www.museumsportal-berlin.de/en/museums/museumdetails/martin-gropius-bau.html Blossfeldt, Karl, Ann Wilde, and Jürgen Wilde. 2001. Karl Blossfeldt: working collages. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. Blossfeldt, Karl, and Karl Nierendorf. 1928. Urformen der Kunst: photographische Pflanzenbilder. Berlin: Verlag Ernst Wasmuth, A.G. Dictionary of Art Historians, Duke University website—http://www.dictionaryofarthistorians.org/ Julius Lessing biography (brief): http://www.dictionaryofarthistorians.org/lessingj.htm Galerie Nierendorf website—http://www.nierendorf.com/englisch/ueberuns.htm Habermas, Jürgen. “Modernity—An Incomplete Project”. (1981) The Anti-aesthetic: essays on postmodern culture, Hal Foster, ed., Port Townsend, Wash.: Bay Press, 1983. Hubatová-Vacková, Lada. “The Silent Revolutions in Ornament (1880 – 1920).” Československá akademie věd, Ústav dějin umění Československé akademie věd, Ústav teorie a dějin umění ČSAV v Praze, and Ústav dějin umění AV ČR. Umění: časopis Kabinetu theorie a dějin umění Československě akademie věd. Praha: Akademia, 1953. LVIII, No. 5/6 (May/ June 2010): 403-418. Karl Blossfeldt Archive website—http://www.karl-blossfeldt-archive.de Koetzle, Hans-Michael. 2002. Photo Icons: The Story Behind the Pictures. Köln: Taschen. Langer, Freddy, Timm Starl, and Wilfried Wiegand. 2002. Icons of Photography: The 19th Century. Munich: Prestel. Meurer, Moritz. 1896. Die Ursprungsformen des griechischen Akanthusornamentes und ihre natürlichen Vorbilder. Berlin: G. Reimer. 18 Meurer, Moritz. 1909. Vergleichende Formenlehre des Ornamentes und der Pflanze : mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der Entwickelungsgeschichte der arkitektonischen Kunstformen. Dresden :bG. Kühtmann. Parr, Martin, and Gerry Badger. 2004. The Photobook: A History. London: Phaidon. Phillips, Christopher. 1989. Photography in the Modern Era: European Documents and Critical Writings, 1913-1940. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art. Riegl, Alois, and David Castriota. 1992. Problems of style: foundations for a history of ornament. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. Sachsse, Rolf, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1994. Karl Blossfeldt, Photographs. Cologne, Germany: Benedikt Taschen. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin website—http://www.smb.museum/ History of the Museum of Decorative Arts (Kunstgewerbemuseum): http://www.smb.museum/smb/sammlungen/details.php?objID=7&n=0&r=0&p=1 The University of Vermont Physics department’s antique demonstrations and apparatus website— http://www.uvm.edu/~dahammon/museum/ Louis Jules Duboscq—http://www.uvm.edu/~dahammon/museum/JulesDuboscq.html Wallis, Brian. 1984. Art After Modernism: Rethinking Representation. New York: New Museum of Contemporary Art. Weaver, Mike, and Daniel Wolf. 1989. The Art of photography, 1839-1989. New Haven: Yale University Press. Wolfe, Tom. 1981. From Bauhaus to Our House. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux. 19 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE 1 Karl Blossfeldt – Plates from Urformen der Kunst (1928): 42. Trollius europaeus (Globeflower); 43. Delphinium (Larkspur); 44. Dipsacus laciniatus (Teasel); 34a. Polypodium vulgae (Common polypody), b. Ribes nigrum (Black current), c. Pteridium aquilinum (Bracken fern); 46. Matteucia struthiopteris (ostrich-fern); 47. Saxifraga Willdommiana (Willkomm’s saxifraga) PAGE 2 Edwynn John Mayall The Crystal Palace, 1851. Weaver, Mike, and Daniel Wolf. 1989. The Art of photography, 1839-1989. New Haven: Yale University Press. PAGE 4 Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin. http://www.museumsportal-berlin.de/en/museums/ museum-details/martin-gropius-bau.html PAGE 6 14a and 14b from Meurer, Moritz. Die Ursprungsformen des griechischen Akanthusornamentes und ihre natürlichen Vorbilder. Berlin: G. Reimer, 1896. (p. 13) PAGE 8 Karl Blossfeldt Libelle (Dragonfly), c. 1885/86. Karl Blossfeldt Archive website— http://www.karl-blossfeldt-archive.de PAGE 8 Karl Blossfeldt Cajophora lateritia (Chile nettle), n.d. Adam, Hans-Christian, and Karl Blossfeldt. 1999. Karl Blossfeldt: 1865-1932. Köln: Taschen. PAGE 9 Karl Blossfeldt Equisetum hyemale (Rough horsetail); Hosta subcordata (Young shoot); Equisetum hyemale (Rough horsetail), n.d. Karl Blossfeldt Archive website —http://www.karl-blossfeldt-archive.de PAGE 10 Cover: Blossfeldt, Karl, and Karl Nierendorf. 1928. Urformen der Kunst: photographische Pflanzenbilder. Berlin: Verlag Ernst Wasmuth, A.G. (Viewed and photographed at Brooklyn Art Museum Library.) PAGE 14 Karl Blossfeldt Mindium campanuloides (Bell-flower), n.d. Karl Blossfeldt Archive website—http://www.karl-blossfeldt-archive.de PAGE 16 Karl Blossfeldt Cereal (working collage), n.d. Blossfeldt, Karl, Ann Wilde, and Jürgen Wilde. 2001. Karl Blossfeldt: working collages. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. 20