Underskog

At the invitation of the Office of Contemporary Art Norway (OCA), in its effort to further investigate the interdisciplinary nature of contemporary art and the important influences of architecture in the historic formulations of modernism, renowned architectural scholar Marco de Michelis will speak on influence of Bauhaus on post-war American art. The presentation will explore this through the practices of two pioneers of Modernism: German-born Josef Albers (1888-1976) and Hungarian-born László Moholy Nagy (1895–1946) and will take place in Oslo centre at the newly reopened house of Gyldendal Forlag, designed by Sverre Fehn.

De Michelis presents how Albers and Moholy-Nagy arose as crucial protagonists to the post-War American art scene. In 1933, Edward M. M. Warburg wrote to Alfred Barr, then influential director of the Museum of Modern Art in New York: “With Albers over here, we have the nucleus of an American Bauhaus!” Starting 1933, Albers took up teaching posts at the legendary Black Mountain College, and later at Harvard and Yale to create the foundations of what would serve to be the beginnings of abstract art in the United States. Some years later, in 1937, Moholy-Nagy is appointed director of the New Bauhaus in Chicago and his book, Vision in Motion (1947) becomes the most comprehensive account of art philosophy at the time.

More about the Speaker:

Marco De Michelis is the Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Design at the IUAV University of Venice and a member of that faculty’s PhD programme in “Theories and History of the Arts.” Having earned his architectural degree in 1969 at the Istituto di Architettura di Venezia, de Michelis has since taught at History of Architecture within the Dipartimento di Storia dell’architettura at the IUAV, where he collaborated closely with the architectural historian Manfredo Tafuri.

A former scholar at the Getty Center for the History of Arts in Santa Monica, CA. de Michelis has been a visiting professor at the Hochschule für bildende Künste in Hamburg (Germany), the “Walter-Gropius-Professor” for theory and history of architecture at the Bauhaus-University in Weimar (Germany, and in 2005, he was appointed Mellon Senior Scholar at the Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montreal. In recent years, he has been a visiting professor at both at the Institute of Fine Arts (New York University) and at the Cooper Union in NYC.

De Michelis’ primary areas of research have focused on the major protagonists of architecture including Walter Gropius, Ludwig Hilberseimer, Leberecht Migge, Antonio Sant’Elia, Giancarlo De Carlo, Luis Barragan, Rudolf Schindler, Carlo Scarpa, Aldo Rossi. In addition he has produced important publications on Soviet Architecture and Town Planning in the 1920s and ‘30s (La cittá sovietica 1925–1937, with E. Pasini, Venice, Marsilio, 1976; _URSS: La Ville, l’architecture_, with J.L. Cohen and M. Tafuri, Paris, L’Equerre/Rome, Officina, 1979) and The Reform Movements in German Architecture between 19th and 20th century (Case del popolo, Bruxelles, AAM/Venezia, Marsilio, 1985–1986; Bauhaus. 1919-1933, with A. Kohlmeyer, Milano, Mazzotta, 1996);

Currently he devotes his research to the crossover in the contemporary art and architecture (Brandt & Böttcher, Milan Electa/Berlin, Ernst & Sohn, 1994 and 1995; Atlante. Tendenze della architettura europea degli anni Novanta, Venice, Marsilio, 1996; Oswald Mathias Ungers, Milan Electa, 1998; with contributions to architectural magazines and exhibition-catalogues on Richard Meier, Daniel Libeskind, Zvi Hecker, Sauerbruch&Hutton, Gino Valle, David Chipperfield, Koning Eizenberg, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Enric Miralles, Olafur Eliasson, Sol Le Witt, Hiroshi Sugimoto).

De Michelis contributes regularly to international magazines including Domus, Casabella, Abitare, Lotus International. He was a member of the editorial board of Daidalos, architektur aktuell, Lotus International and of Casabella. From 1989–1991, he was appointed Editor-in-chief of Ottagono.

This event organized by OCA as part of its Semesterplan 2008 has been additionally and generously supported by the Istituto Italiano di Cultura in Oslo.

Office for Contemporary Art Norway

The Office for Contemporary Art Norway is a private foundation and was founded by The Norwegian Ministry of Culture and Church Affairs and The Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in fall 2001. The main aim of the Office for Contemporary Art Norway is to develop collaborations in contemporary art between Norway and the international art scene. The Office for Contemporary Art Norway aims to become a profiled contributor to the discourses of contemporary art.