Symposium
bauhaus imaginista: Moving Away

Moving Away – Bauhaus Pedagogy

Sunday, 2 December 2018, 10:00-17:00
10:00 AM - 17:00 Lecture Room II, India International Centre Annexe

RSVP: Sonali-Kapoor.Pruthi@goethe.de

Schedule:

Established in 1919 in the immediate aftermath of WWI, the Bauhaus reflected a generation who wished to reject its nationalistic and authoritarian past. While the school is associated with iconic works of modernist design, its innovations were significant in terms of teaching. Bauhaus pedagogy was not a unified phenomenon, but like the school itself, its identity and methods were contested and adapted during its various phases. The Bauhaus responded to a set of historical circumstances coinciding with the Weimar Republic. It was shaped by this period and finally closed by the National Socialists in 1933. It was also implicated in contemporary developments in art and architecture, including Expressionism, Constructivism and the Neues Bauen. Consequently, Bauhaus pedagogy cannot be lifted wholesale out of its historical context. Instead, we can look at how elements such as foundational training in design, emphasis on practical workshop-based learning, and the school’s fundamental goal to transform society through art, design and architecture can be reinterpreted and assessed in different instances and in terms of their potential. 
 
The centenary project bauhaus imaginista provides a unique opportunity to think about art and design pedagogy and its relation to society from a transnational perspective. While the Bauhaus is a basic reference, the aim is to avoid obscuring the other key educational projects of the twentieth century or to think only in terms of influence. While certain schools continued Bauhaus pedagogy through émigré figures, others developed in parallel or agonistically to the Bauhaus model. Drawing on the expertise of our research partners in India, the symposium in New Delhi, which accompanies the exhibition Moving Away, will address art and design education through contemporary and historical education examples from the sub-continent, looking at schools including Kala Bhavan Santiniketan, the Faculty of Fine Arts MSU Baroda and the National Institute of Design Ahmedabad. 
 
Speakers include: Kathleen James Chakraborty, Anshuman Dasgupta, Suchitra Balasubrahmanyan, Mayank Mansingh Kaul, David Abraham, Sabih Ahmed, Tanishka Kachru, S Balaram, Saif Ul Haque, Kazi Ashraf, Prasad Shetty, Rupali Gupte, and Natasha Ginwala.
 
The symposium is programmed by Grant Watson and Marion von Osten in collaboration with Suchitra Balasubrahmanyan, Anshuman Dasgupta, Natasha Ginwala and with Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan New Delhi.
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The symposium and the exhibition are part of bauhaus imaginista’s 2018 series of events celebrating the centenary of the Bauhaus school (1919-1933) in Germany, a project investigating the worldly relations of the Bauhaus across major geopolitical transformations of the twentieth century. The Bauhaus school radicalized design pedagogy and stood for a cosmopolitan vision, acting within the transnational network of the modernist movement. The Bauhaus hosted students and teachers from various world regions. Through flight and migration following its closure by the Nazis in 1933, Bauhauslers were in contact with other modern movements in Asian, American and African countries. Over the course of 2018, artistic directors Marion von Osten and Grant Watson—in cooperation with a team of international researchers, artists and designers—have developed a research project, including four separate exhibitions in China, Japan, Russia and Brazil, complemented by discursive events in India, the United States, Morocco and Nigeria, held in partnership with local art and design institutions and the Goethe-Instituts. From 15 March to 10 June 2019, the final exhibition bauhaus imaginsta will be on view at Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin (HKW).
 
bauhaus imaginista is a collaboration between the Bauhaus Cooperation Berlin Dessau Weimar, the Goethe-Institut and Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin (HKW). The research project with its different exhibition stations is taking place for the centenary of the founding of the Bauhaus. It will be enhanced with international perspectives of the Goethe-Instituts and tied together as part of the long-term project 100 Years of Now in 2019 at Haus der Kulturen der Welt. bauhaus imaginista is made possible by funds from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media. The German Federal Cultural Foundation is supporting the exhibition in Berlin and the German Foreign Office the stations abroad. Mediapartners are 3sat and Deutschlandfunk Kultur. Partners abroad are the Goethe-Instituts in China, New Delhi, Lagos, Moscow, New York, Rabat, São Paulo, and Tokyo as well as Le Cube – independent art room (Rabat) and other institutions. bauhaus imaginista is realized in collaboration with the China Design Museum / China Academy of Art (Hangzhou), the Independent Administrative Institution of National Museum of Art / The National Museum of Modern Art Kyoto, Garage Museum of Contemporary Art (Moscow) and SESC São Paulo.
 
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