Frederick John Kiesler

Friedrich Kiesler ( born September 22, 1890 in Czernowitz, Bukovina, Austria - Hungary, † December 27, 1965 in New York City, also engl. Frederick Kiesler ) was an Austrian-American architect, artist, designer and stage designer. He spent the first part of his life in Europe before emigrating to the United States in 1926, there continued his work and with the Shrine of the Book in Jerusalem, as if his life's work, completed in 1965.

2.2.2 Saks Fifth Avenue, New York 1928
2.2.3 the Film Guild Cinema, New York 1929
2.2.4 Furniture exhibition of AUDAC, New York 1930
2.2.5 Double Theatre for Woodstock 1931
2.2.6 Space House 1933

2.4.1 Laboratory for Design Correlation, Columbia University, New York 1937-1941
2.4.2 Art of This Century, Peggy Guggenheim Gallery, New York 1942
2.4.3 exhibition of the National Council of American - Soviet Friendship, Inc., Moscow 1944
2.4.4 Bloodflames, Hugo Gallery, New York 1947
2.4.5 exhibition Le Surréalisme en 1947 at the Galerie Maeght, Paris 1947

2.5.1 Endless House, Kootz Gallery, New York 1950
2.5.2 Galaxies ( 1950 )
2.5.3 World House Gallery, New York 1957
2.5.4 Endless House, Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1959
2.5.6 sculptures, 1962
2.5.7 Grotto for Meditation, 1964
2.5.8 Shrine of the Book, Jerusalem 1965

Life

From 1908 to 1909 Friedrich Kiesler studied at the Technical University and the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. 1920 married Kiesler philology student Stefanie Fresh in the Vienna synagogue. After organizing the new International Exhibition of Theatre Technology 1924 he developed in 1925 for the Paris Exhibition Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes, the city space as a vision of a floating city of the future.

In 1926 he went with his wife Stefi to New York and became there the figure of integration of European avant-garde and the young American art. He established himself as a visual artist and stage designer, architect and designer. From 1937 he took a teaching position at Columbia University and intensified where the confrontation with his holistic theory of correalism.

On September 3, 1963 Stefi Kiesler died in New York. Friedrich Kiesler suffered a heart attack on March 9, 1964 and married on May 26, still in hospital Lillian Olinsey. 1965 finally died Frederick Kiesler.

In 1997, the Austrian Frederick and Lillian Kiesler Private Foundation was established, which deals with the study of his work and the biennial Friedrich Kiesler Prize, among other awards. It is funded almost exclusively by the public sector.

Work

Early years (1923 to 1925)

Set design for W.U.R., Berlin 1923

Kiesler's " electro- mechanical" stage Karel Čapek's play WUR for achieved a resounding success in the international avant-garde gathered in Berlin. After one of the first performances Kiesler Hans Richter, Theo van Doesburg, László Moholy -Nagy and El Lissitzky met; these were coincidence, which influenced his artistic career decisively.

International Exhibition of New Theatre Technology, Vienna 1924

Kiesler organized the International exhibition of new technology in the context of theater music and theater festival of the city of Vienna. He wore for a few hundred theater concepts, stage and costume designs, posters and models of the artistic avant-garde, among others from Russia, Italy, Germany, France and Austria together. For the exhibition architecture, he designed the Leger and support system, a flexible, free-standing structure for the presentation of objects and images. Kiesler also designed the poster, the catalog, the ticket and the stationery of the exhibition on a uniform design. For the exhibition Kiesler realized the spiral space stage.

Exposition internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes, Paris 1925

Thanks to the great success of the exhibition in Vienna in 1924 Kiesler was entrusted by Josef Hoffmann in order to make the Austrian pavilion at the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris. He designed a monumental, floating structure, the City in Space ( Space City ).

Departure to the United States ( 1926-1933 )

Still in Paris Kiesler was invited by Jane Heap, to design the International Theatre Exposition in New York. Kiesler introduced avant-garde stage designs of Constructivism, Futurism, and the Bauhaus. He also showed his concept of Endless Theatre, a further development phase of the Space Stage.

Saks Fifth Avenue, New York 1928

1927 Kiesler began to work on the design of pocket expenses for the department store Saks Fifth Avenue in New York. His experience, he published in 1930 as a book entitled Contemporary Art Applied To The Store And Its display.

The Film Guild Cinema, New York 1929

With large and positive echo in the media in 1929, designed by Kiesler the Film Guild Cinema opened, the so-called "100% cinema".

Furniture exhibition of A.U.D.A.C., New York 1930

For the issuance of A.U.D.A.C. (American Union of Decorative Artists and Craftsman ) in the Grand Central Palace designed Kiesler berths, which equip the invited members of the AUDAC. He even shows in addition to its office furniture, such as the Flying Desk, photos, and designs for design and architecture projects.

Double Theatre Woodstock 1931

As part of a competition involving, among others, Frank Lloyd Wright participates, designed Kiesler 1931, the Festival Theatre for Woodstock. Although Kiesler won this tender, could not be realized this project for financial reasons.

SpaceHouse 1933

1933 built Kiesler for Modernage Furniture Company in New York, the Space House. In this scale model of a single-family home furniture furniture store was presented.

New appeal as a stage (from 1934)

From 1934 to 1956 Kiesler taught at the Juilliard School of Music. Many of his innovative and revolutionary ideas for stage designs could be realized in the coming years: in Erskine's opera Helen Retires (1934 ) determined the curving contour of the equipment. In Seymour In the Pasha 's Garden (1935 ) Kiesler began projections of oversized floral elements. The prospectuses of Sartre's No Exit (1946) and Darius Milhaud's Le pauvre Matelot (1948 ) showed strong surrealist elements.

Furniture and office design ( 1937-1947 )

Kiesler's early furniture design of the 30s pointed in form and function on late modern design. So Kiesler created with the Nesting Table a flexible table object, which anticipates the in the 50s so popular kidney-shaped table in his formal language. The bed- couch for Charles Mergentine and Party Lounge demonstrate Kiesler's claim to a convertible and multifunctional shapes. 1936 Frederick Kiesler handed the patent for a Table Lamp and Construction as well as for the Party Lounge & Furniture Construction a.

Laboratory for Design Correlation, Columbia University, New York 1937 - 1941

In the autumn of 1937 Kiesler founded at Columbia University in the Laboratory for Design Correlation, which he directed until its closure in 1941. The aim of this institute was to develop a holistic design concept that is scientifically justified and analytical. Close observation of human behavior, movement patterns and physiological conditions should lead to improve the design of furnishings and utensils, and thus the living conditions of the people fundamentally. In Kiesler's Project Vision Machine manifested themselves the results of Kiesler's multi-year practical and theoretical studies of perception, which he intensive use in the Laboratory for Design Correlation at Columbia University since 1937. In collaboration with students from the Columbia University Kiesler designed the Mobile Home Library, the first fully mature product design the Institute. These flexible books rack was the result of an exemplary functional analysis, the model the " correalist design process " shows.

Art of This Century, Peggy Guggenheim Gallery, New York 1942

Peggy Guggenheim Kiesler asked to design a gallery for her art collection, enabled the new methods for the display of paintings, drawings, sculptures and objects. Kiesler designed for four exhibition rooms of the Art of This Century revolutionary presentation systems with multifunctional furniture: In the Surrealist Gallery was Kiesler frameless images appear to float freely in space, in the abstract gallery, he presented works of geometric art in a system of interconnected braced space elements and in the kinetic gallery he designed, among other viewing apparatus works by Marcel Duchamp and Paul Klee.

Exhibition of the National Council of American - Soviet Friendship, Inc., Moscow 1944

On behalf of the American Association of Architects ( Architects' Committee of the National Council of American - Soviet Friendship ) Kiesler conceived an exhibition of American architecture and urban planning for Moscow.

Bloodflames, Hugo Gallery, New York 1947

At the exhibition, designed by Kiesler participated artists such as David Hare, Arshile Gorky, Roberto Matta, and Isamu Noguchi. The colored total space of the Hugo Gallery already pointed to the essential features of the interior concept of the Endless House.

Exhibition Le Surréalisme en 1947 at the Galerie Maeght, Paris 1947

Kiesler was asked by Max Ernst and Marcel Duchamp implement as an exhibition designer and Mediator their concept of a comprehensive Surrealismusausstellung at Galerie Maeght. Frederick Kiesler designed, among other things, the Salle de Superstition (room of superstition ), a cave-like work of art, which he described as " magical architecture". Works by Joan Miró, Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst and David Hare were manufactured under Kiesler's instructions and integrated into this moving exhibition interior. Kiesler even made also the totem of all religion and the anti- Taboo -Figure on - two sculptural units that have shaped both content and structure to the final room.

Late work ( 1950-1965 )

Endless House, Kootz Gallery, New York 1950

The Kootz Gallery 1950 organized the exhibition The Muralist and the Modern Architect with the aim to make the collaboration of architects and artists for discussion. The sculptor David Hare Kiesler invited to attend. Thus, the first three-dimensional model for a Endless House was born. Its ovoid shape grips the Endless Theatre from 1926 on again. From 1950 Kiesler formulated his concept of the Endless House in numerous texts, models, drawings and plans that treat mainly the interiors and their functions, as well as the lighting.

Galaxies ( 1950 )

When Galaxies Kiesler described a synthesis of painting, sculpture and architecture. He looked at the various art forms as equivalent and emphasized the relationship of the artwork to the space and the viewer. The principles of correalism form the basis for the development of the Galaxy.

World House Gallery, New York 1957

Even as Kiesler worked on the concept of Endless House, he got the collector Herbert Mayer the offer to remodel several rooms of the Carlyle Hotels in a gallery. The architect Armand Bartos he conceived continuously merge into each other floors, ceilings and walls. In January 1957, the two storey stone gallery opens the form with the exhibition The Struggle for New.

Endless House, Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1959

The Museum of Modern Art commissioned Kiesler 1958 in order to develop a single family home for the museum garden. The Endless House in 1:1 scale was not realized, however, presented the MoMA in 1960 in the exhibition Visionary Architecture Kiesler large model of the Endless House.

The Universal Theatre was created as a contribution to the competition from the Ford Foundation and followed in form and content to the concept of " infinite space ". Kiesler deliberately set a technical and aesthetic innovations to meet the changing demands of stage space and image as well as for the government.

Sculptures, 1962

In his last years of life gained Kiesler's sculptural experiments are becoming increasingly important, his work was devoted to the predominantly related to the surrounding space spatial installation. It emerged, the Environmental Sculptures as Last Judgement and Us- You-Me. Kiesler intended to design the various elements as interdependent units, without losing the effect of the single object from the eyes. The monumental sculpture Bucephalus (the name of the horse of Alexander the Great) remained unfinished and was Kiesler's last attempt to give his idea of the Endless House form.

Grotto for Meditation 1964

For the utopians commune in New Harmony, Indiana Kiesler designed a meditation room, which was never implemented and has been preserved only in models.

Shrine of the Book, Jerusalem 1965

The Shrine of the Book is the only major building realized by Friedrich Kiesler, at the planning, he worked with the architect Armand Bartos since 1957. As still currently the subject of theoretical discourse, gives us the Shrine of the Book - not least because of the interlocking interaction between symbolic form and structural design - always new perspectives and modes of interpretation of Kiesler's life's work.

Selected Literature

Austrian Frederick and Lillian Kiesler Private Foundation (ed.): Friedrich Kiesler, designer. Seating Furniture of the 30s and 40s. Hatje Cantz, Ostfildern 2005, ISBN 3-7757-1544-4.
Susan Davidson, Philip Rylands (ed.): Peggy Guggenheim & Frederick Kiesler. The Story of Art of This Century. Hatje Cantz, Ostfildern -Ruit 2004, ISBN 3-7757-1557-6.
Austrian Frederick and Lillian Kiesler Private Foundation and others ( ed.): Frederick Kiesler. Art of This Century. Hatje Cantz, Ostfildern -Ruit 2003, ISBN 3-7757-1281- X.
Austrian Frederick and Lillian Kiesler Private Foundation and others ( ed.): Frederick Kiesler. Endless House from 1947 to 1961. Hatje Cantz, Ostfildern -Ruit 2003, ISBN 3-7757-1336-0.
Dieter Bogner, Peter Noever (ed.): Frederick J. Kiesler. Endless Space. Hatje Cantz, Ostfildern -Ruit 2003, ISBN 3-7757-1047-7.
Dieter Bogner: Friedrich Kiesler 1890-1965. Inside The Endless House ( = special exhibition at the Historical Museum of the City of Vienna, 231). Böhlau, Vienna et al 1997, ISBN 3-205-98838-8.
Dieter Bogner: Frederick Kiesler. Architect, painter, sculptor. From 1890 to 1965. Vienna, Löcker 1988, ISBN 3-85409-124-9.
Roland Lelke: The endless space in Frederick Kiesler's Shrine of the Book. Shaker, Aachen, 1999, ISBN 3- 8265-4806 -X ( At the same time: Aachen University of Technology, PhD Thesis, 1998).

Hans Richter (artist) Constructivism (art) Berth (sleeping) Erskine (disambiguation) Teapoy The Art of This Century gallery New Harmony (Indiana) Integrated Authority File

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