How Did Bauhaus Art Influence The Ultra-flat Movement

Bauhaus art influence to the super flat movement
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Bauhaus art influence to the super flat movement
Introduction
Globally, few artistic movements have ever had as much impact on our daily lives as the Bauhaus movement. Bauhaus movement was a powerful art and design association initiated in Weimar, Germany, in 1919. It stimulated instructors and scholars to develop their arts together in design studios and workshops. The movement was more focused on reuniting fine arts and functional design while developing items that were more practical while incorporating the soul of artworks. Therefore, this essay will focus on how Bauhaus art influenced the super flat movement, which is the transition from traditional graphic design to modern graphic design. With the development of technology, presenting three-dimensional items on the two-dimensional becomes easier. However, the super flat is the mainstream now. We still can find something similar to the Bauhaus style.[Čapková, Helena. "Bauhaus Imaginista: Review of Central European Affairs." NewPerspectives 27, no. 1 (2019): 159-162,179.https://search.proquest.com/docview/2220696178?accountid=45049]
Summary of the Bauhaus movement
Bauhaus movement is one of the most prominent art schools of the 20th century. The movement originated from Walter Gropius, who believed in bringing artists and craftsmen together for the utopian purpose. Walter was largely motivated by the architectural works of Frank Lloyd and designer William Morris. Bauhaus's approach to education and association between art, people and technology had a substantial effect on major continents such as Europe and the United States after its closure in 1932 under the harassment by Nazis. Bauhaus movement wanted to address variances between fine and applied arts while encouraging innovation, mass production and use of technology.[Čapková, Helena. "Bauhaus Imaginista: Review of Central European Affairs." NewPerspectives 27, no. 1 (2019): 159-162,179.https://search.proquest.com/docview/2220696178?accountid=45049]
Even though the movement eliminated many aspects of traditional fine arts, it deeply sought to enhance the theoretical and intellectual approaches of these subjects. Therefore, it joined together most of the artistic and design elements that were more beneficial while the hierarchy of arts that stood at that time was discarded. Moreover, it refined most of the practical crafts such as textiles and interior designs by use of fine arts such as painting and sculpture. For example, Breuer and Marianne Brandt adopted the features of stylish minimalism in their furniture and utensils design. Similarly, Gropius and Mies integrated glassy international style, a critical feature in architecture up to date. Bauhaus's focus on experimentation and solving problems in the field of arts is another notable feature. In a nutshell, the Bauhaus movement has led to a change in the direction in fine arts as well as the advancement of the artistic process as a science research rather than history or literature.[Fisher, Joshua A. "Bauhaus scenography for virtual reality." Virtual Creativity 8, no. 1 (2018):39-57] [Helena, Bauhaus Imaginista, 160]
Super-flat movement
The super-flat movement dates back to 2001 when Takashi Murakami initiated postmodern art movements. The movement sought to assemble and compress arts from past centuries before the Second World War such as anime and manga. He encouraged artists to join the movement to put Japan on the art on the world map. Today, the Superflat movement has evolved to become a global sensation incorporating all concepts of consumer culture from low to high art. It is believed the super-flat movement sought to promote the development of artwork, manage and support upcoming artists, planning of projects as well as promotion and production of art products.[Shamoon, Deborah. "7 The Superflat Space of Japanese Anime." In Asian Cinema and the Use ofSpace, pp. 109-124. Routledge, 2015.] ["Superflat Movement Overview". 2019. The Art Story./movement/superflat/.] [Deborah, The Superflat Space of Japanese Anime, 115]
In other words, super-flat did not only account for non-three-dimensional styles of Japanese art but also understandings on the composition of consumer culture. Not only does super flat expand the movement, but it also enhanced its foundation through artists across the world who are consistently stimulated by streamflow of imagery and message across media platforms. Moreover, super-flat has successfully and profoundly differentiated between fine and commercial art, graphic design as well as product design and development. As a matter of fact, it has transformed the misuse of world visual culture toward inventing and production of inventive pieces of art that are available to all people across all economic fields. Superflat drew on the visual styles of anime and woodblock prints in the artwork. These inspirations become the basis of the Murakami super flat theory. While eastern art focused on two-dimensional practices, western arts were modeled into three-dimensional forms of centuries. Murakami argued the Japanese culture had lost the distinction between high and low culture, which he fully embraced.[Deborah, The Superflat Space of Japanese Anime, 118] [Deborah, The Superflat Space of Japanese Anime, 122]
Impacts Bauhaus movement to the modern design
Bauhaus which means “house of building” advocated that all art students should receive the basic training in design, color theory and art materials irrespective of their backgrounds. Afterward, the students would specialize in other fields such as metalworking, typography, pottery, weaving, and cabinet making. These courses stimulated scholars to integrate technology into their designs as well as stressing on the need to create designs that could be produced in large numbers. In reality, this concept is what led to the utilitarian-style system which is associated with this movement.[Dong, Haibin, Zilu Wang, and Wei Wang. "Digital Bauhaus exploration and analysis." in Proceedingsof the 10th International Conference on Education Technology and Computers, pp. 152-156.ACM, 2018]
While in this school, students learned how to refine their objects, making them more appealing while still enhancing their accessibility. In 1925, the school was moved to a new building in Dessau which merged the principles of new design such as; steel frame construction, glass curtain wall, and asymmetrical pinwheel plan. Today, most modern designs are associated with Bauhaus such as furniture as well as lightweight weight metal chairs. Interestingly, Bauhaus furniture is still in the market up to date.[Kyriakopoulos, Konstantinos. "The Bauhaus movement and its influence in graphic design, visualcommunication and architecture in Greece” 27, no. 2 (2016): 33-44.]
On the other hand, the textile program encouraged students to experiment with different materials as well as create pieces that were hung throughout the school as well as to the stark spaces. The weaving program opened doors for many women to join the school, which was not common during that time. Today, fashion designers are encouraged by the design school attitude “less is more”. Gone are the days when fashion was an indolent, floral, and decorative style of the Art Deco movement, which was replaced with Bauhaus strong geometric forms and contrastive colors. Paul Smith, Mary Katrantzou and Jil Sanders are some of the most celebrated fashion designers who were inspired by Bauhaus. On the high-street, Bauhaus school can be related to famous brands such as COS and Toast.["Bauhaus Movement Overview". 2019. The Art Story./movement/bauhaus/.] [Poon, Stephen TF. "Typography Inspirations in 21st-Century: Social and Cultural Roles ofModernist Bauhaus in Graphic Design." International Journal 2, no. 7 (2019): 23-37.]
A change in school leadership saw Hannes Meyer ,the new head introduced the architectural department. Nevertheless, his term was short-lived and was replaced by Ludwig Mies, who led the school before it relocated to Berlin- where it was forced to close after a year in operation. However, its closure did not kill the vision of the Bauhaus movement but rather led to the spread of students and teachers to different regions across the world. For instance, some designs schools in America such as Black Mountain College was pioneered by some of Bauhaus graduates and professors. Today, the Bauhaus movement projects and achievements can be seen almost everywhere. Similarly, the obligation to finding resolutions that were simple, normal and practical is an approach that is still taught to artists and designers up to date.[Le Masson, Pascal, Armand Hatchuel, and Benoit Weil. "Design theory at Bauhaus: teaching“splitting” knowledge." Research in Engineering Design 27, no. 2 (2016): 91-115.]
Characteristics of Bauhaus arts
Bauhaus art is based on a no-frills, no-gimmicks approach that favors utility over show. The idea can be observed in major inventions where the movement had a substantial influence such as modern furniture design and architecture. For instance, chairs and building in the mold of Bauhaus there is stark bluntness to it, with sharp corners and edges and strong l...