"Ornament and Crime" is an essay and lecture by modernist architect Adolf Loos that criticizes ornament in useful objects.
"Ornament and Crime" is an essay and lecture by modernist architect Adolf Loos that criticizes ornament in useful objects.
Contrary to popular belief that it was composed in 1908, Adolf Loos first gave the lecture in 1910 at the Akademischer Verband für Literatur und Musik in Vienna. The essay was then published in 1913 in Les Cahiers d’aujourd’hui in French as Ornement et Crime. Only in 1929 was the essay published in German in the Frankfurter Zeitung , as Ornament und Verbrechen. It was the architect Henry Kulka, who assisted Loos during a reprint of the essay in 1931 in Trotzdem, that altered the original year to 1908 after he consulted Loos, who either didn't remember well or wanted to assume primacy in the confrontation against the Secessionists. [1]
The essay was written when Art Nouveau—known as Secession in Austria and which Loos had excoriated even at its height in 1900—was showing a new way forward for modern art. The essay was important in articulating some moralizing views, inherited from the Arts and Crafts movement, which would be fundamental to the Bauhaus design studio, and would help define the ideology of modernism in architecture.
"The evolution of culture marches with the elimination of ornament from useful objects," Loos proclaimed, thus linking the optimistic sense of the linear and upward progress of cultures with the contemporary vogue for applying evolution to cultural contexts. [2] Loos's work was prompted by regulations he encountered when he designed a building without ornamentation opposite a palace. He eventually conceded to requirements by adding window flower boxes. [3]
In the essay, Loos explains his philosophy, describing how ornamentation can have the effect of causing objects to go out of style and thus become obsolete. It struck him that it was a crime to waste the effort needed to add ornamentation, when the ornamentation would cause the object to soon go out of style. Loos introduced a sense of the "immorality" of ornament, describing it as "degenerate", its suppression as necessary for regulating modern society. He took as one of his examples the tattooing of the "Papuan" and the intense surface decorations of the objects about him—Loos says that, in the eyes of western culture, the Papuan has not evolved to the moral and civilized circumstances of modern man, who, should he tattoo himself, would either be considered a criminal or a degenerate. [4] [5]
Loos never argued for the complete absence of ornamentation, but believed that it had to be appropriate to the type of material. [3]
Loos concluded that "No ornament can any longer be made today by anyone who lives on our cultural level ... Freedom from ornament is a sign of spiritual strength". [5]
Adolf Franz Karl Viktor Maria Loos was an Austrian and Czechoslovak architect, influential European theorist, and a polemicist of modern architecture. He was inspired by modernism and a widely-known critic of the Art Nouveau movement. His controversial views and literary contributions sparked the establishment of the Vienna Secession movement and postmodernism.
Oskar Kokoschka was an Austrian artist, poet, playwright, and teacher best known for his intense expressionistic portraits and landscapes, as well as his theories on vision that influenced the Viennese Expressionist movement.
The year 1913 in architecture involved some significant events.
The year 1910 in architecture involved some significant architectural events and new buildings.
Form follows function is a principle of design associated with late 19th- and early 20th-century architecture and industrial design in general, which states that the shape of a building or object should primarily relate to its intended function or purpose.
In architecture and decorative art, ornament is decoration used to embellish parts of a building or object. Large figurative elements such as monumental sculpture and their equivalents in decorative art are excluded from the term; most ornaments do not include human figures, and if present they are small compared to the overall scale. Architectural ornament can be carved from stone, wood or precious metals, formed with plaster or clay, or painted or impressed onto a surface as applied ornament; in other applied arts the main material of the object, or a different one such as paint or vitreous enamel may be used.
The Wiener Moderne or Viennese Modernism is a term describing the culture of Vienna in the period between approximately 1890 and 1910. It refers especially to the development of modernism in the Austrian capital and its effect on the spheres of philosophy, literature, music, art, design and architecture.
Mikhail Osipovich Eisenstein was a civil engineer and architect working in Riga, the present-day capital of Latvia, when the city was part of the Russian Empire. He was active as an architect in the city at a time of great economic expansion and consequent enlargement, which coincided with the flourishing of Art Nouveau architecture. During the years 1901–1906, Eisenstein designed many of the best-known Art Nouveau buildings of Riga. His son, Sergei Eisenstein, became a well-known Soviet film director.
Adolf Bruno Behne was a German critic, art historian, architectural writer, and artistic activist. He was one of the leaders of the Avant Garde in the Weimar Republic.
Frederick Jacob Kiesler was an Austrian-American architect, theoretician, theater designer, artist and sculptor.
Design theory is a subfield of design research concerned with various theoretical approaches towards understanding and delineating design principles, design knowledge, and design practice.
The Villa Müller is a Modernist villa in Prague, Czech Republic built in 1930. It was designed by Adolf Loos as a residence for František Müller, co-owner of the Kapsa-Müller construction company from Plzeň.
Claire Beck Loos was a Czechoslovakian photographer and writer. She was the third wife of early modernist Czechoslovak-Austrian architect Adolf Loos.
Stripped Classicism is primarily a 20th-century classicist architectural style stripped of most or all ornamentation, frequently employed by governments while designing official buildings. It was adopted by both totalitarian and democratic regimes. The style embraces a "simplified but recognizable" classicism in its overall massing and scale while eliminating traditional decorative detailing. The orders of architecture are only hinted at or are indirectly implicated in the form and structure.
Henry Kulka was a Czech-New Zealand architect. He was a key figure in the development of Raumplan architecture in central Europe between 1919 and 1938. Kulka brought this approach to spatial planning and the Loosian traditions of natural material craftsmanship to modern building in New Zealand (1940–1971) where he was a pioneer of modern architecture.
Nazi architecture is the architecture promoted by Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime from 1933 until its fall in 1945, connected with urban planning in Nazi Germany. It is characterized by three forms: a stripped neoclassicism, typified by the designs of Albert Speer; a vernacular style that drew inspiration from traditional rural architecture, especially alpine; and a utilitarian style followed for major infrastructure projects and industrial or military complexes. Nazi ideology took a pluralist attitude to architecture; however, Hitler himself believed that form follows function and wrote against "stupid imitations of the past".
Lauren Kalman is a contemporary American visual artist who uses photography, sculpture, jewelry, craft objects, performance, and installation. Kalman's works investigate ideas of beauty, body image, and consumer culture. Kalman has taught at institutions including Brown University and the Rhode Island School of Design. Currently she is an associate professor at Wayne State University.
J. Yolande Daniels is an American architect, designer and educator. She is a founding principal of studioSUMO, an architecture firm that speaks to socio-cultural landscapes through design.
The Duchess of Montesquiou-Fezensac is a 1910 oil portrait by Oskar Kokoschka. In this expressionist work Kokoschka strove to capture the essence of his sitter, a young noblewoman afflicted with tuberculosis, with somber tones and stylized gestures. Among his early portraits, Kokoschka considered the work his most valuable, and as his first work to be acquired by a museum it played a key role in establishing the young artist's reputation. During the Nazi period it was confiscated from the Museum Folkwang in Essen and pilloried in the Degenerate Art exhibition before being auctioned off. It is currently in the collection of the Cincinnati Art Museum.
Lina Loos was an Austrian cabaret actress and feuilleton journalist. She is best remembered for her appearances at the Linden-Cabaret in Berlin, and for her posthumous collection of writings edited by Adolf Opel. She was briefly married to Adolf Loos. Her life was the subject of the German film Lina (2017).
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) CS1 maint: location (link) CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Other | |
