The events are generally described the same way. On January 30, 1933, Adolf Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany and the Third Reich assumed power. In April, the Gestapo padlocked the doors of the Bauhaus school, in Berlin, a renowned institution for art and design. Having closed the Bauhaus, the propaganda minister of the Reich said it could reopen if it embraced a nationalistic style. The faculty members refused, and the school’s doors never opened again. Some of the Bauhaus geniuses had already fled to other countries; many of the rest now followed. There was no other version of the history. End of story.
At the Bauhaus, during the 14 years it existed, human creativity reached an apogee that inspired comparisons to the Italian Renaissance. Thanks to such lights as Josef and Anni Albers, Marcel Breuer, Walter Gropius, Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, the art of painting entered new territory, and the look of household objects took a bold step into an unprecedented realm of simplicity and functionality. Armchairs and side tables became objects of Platonic beauty. Architecture was freed of clutter. Graphic design, textile-making, metalwork, glasswork, theater sets—all that was visible became clear and luminous as never before. Even doorknobs had a freshness that put joy in the air.
