Transcript Charles Rennie Mackintosh

Gerrit Rietveld
1888-1964
“We didn't avoid older styles because they
were ugly, or because we couldn't
reproduce them, but because our own
times demanded their own form, I mean,
their own manifestation. It was of course
extremely difficult to achieve all this in
spite of the building regulations and that's
why the interior of the downstairs part of
the house is somewhat traditional, I mean
with fixed walls. But upstairs we simply
called it an 'attic' and that's where we
actually made the house we wanted.”
Gerrit Rietveld speaking about the Schröder House
The chronological context
of Rietveld’s architecture
Chronological context in Architecture
- Modernism to Postmodernism 1890s
1900s
1910s
First generation
modernists
1920s
1930s
1940s
1950s
Second generation
modernists
1960s
1970s
1980s
1990s
Third generation
modernists
The pioneers of modernism.
They each treated form, space,
structure, materials and ornament in
novel ways.
These were the architects of ‘high
modernism’- the universal
International Style- as well as the
fashionable Art Deco period.
These were the architects of
Postmodernism.
They reacted against the orthodoxy of
high modernism.
Peter Behrens -
Berlin
Walter Gropius
Frank Gehry
Auguste Perret -
Paris
Le Corbusier
Philip Johnson
C. R. Mackintosh -
Glasgow
Mies van der Rohe
Charles Moore
Otto Wagner -
Vienna
Gerrit Rietveld
I. M. Pei
Adolf Loos -
Vienna
William Van Allen
Michael Greaves
Louis Sullivan -
Chicago
Napier Art Deco architects
Louis Kahn
Frank Lloyd Wright - Chicago and mid-western states of USA
Robert Venturi
The context of his architecture
Geographical context:
Gerrit Rietveld was a Dutch furniture maker, architect and designer based in Utrecht,
Holland.
Utrecht
Context and the De Stijl Movement
Historical context:
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Gerrit Rietveld was a pioneer of the International Style of modernist architecture.
Through his furniture and architecture he became one of the most influential
designers of the 20th century. His most significant building is the Schröder House
in Utrecht, Holland constructed in 1924.
Rietveld was a second generation modernist and a contemporary of Le Corbusier
and Mies van der Rohe.
Rietveld was a founding member of the Dutch De Stijl movement. His designs
were influenced by Frank Lloyd Wright and the abstract expressionist paintings of
Mondrian. Rietveld and the De Stijl group had a significant influence on the
Bauhaus and the early work of Mies van der Rohe.
Click here to find out what the De Stijl movement was and to answer the following:
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4.
What does the term ‘De Stijl’ mean, and how did the name come into use?
List FOUR stylistic features of De Stijl design.
Name the three artists central to the De Stijl movement.
When did the De Stijl movement enjoy its most success?
Create your own De Stijl painting in the style of Piet Mondrian.
The Schröder House, Utrecht, Holland, 1924
“No one had ever looked at this little lane before this house was
built here. There was a dirty crumbling wall with weeds growing in
front of it… It was a deserted place, where anyone who wanted to
pee just did it against this wall. It was a real piece of no-man's
land. And we said, 'Yes, this is just right, let's build it here.' And we
took this plot of ground and made it into a place with a reality of
its own…and that's always been my main aim: to give to a yet
unformed space, a certain meaning.”
Gerrit Rietveld
The Schröder House, Utrecht, Holland, 1924
Visit the house here to answer these questions about
this building’s context and function:
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7.
Describe the circumstance in which Rietveld
was commissioned to design the house.
What evidence once existed of a personal
relationship between the client, Mrs SchröderSchräder and the architect Gerrit Rietveld?
List THREE functions of the lower level of the
house and TWO functions of the upper level of
the house.
Describe TWO ways space is treated in a
modernist way in the upper level of the house.
Gerrit Rietveld was impressed with the
architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright. See if you
can identify THREE Wright influences in the
design of this house.
Describe the colour palette of this house and
identify from the six images in the linked
webpage SIX specific features of the house that
are different in colour or shade of colour.
Explain TWO ways this house exemplifies the
concept of ‘functionalist’ architecture.
Plan of the Schröder House interiors
Ground floor plan.
Upper level floor plan.
Stylistic features of the Schröder House - exterior
The building appears as if a conceived as a three
dimensional Mondrian painting (far left, centre) or
the realisation of Theo van Doesburg’s neoplastic
designs (far left top).
Black and primary-coloured accents compliment the
white and grey shades of the apparently ‘floating’
planar walls.
Horizontal planes cantilever out from the inner
core of the building.
Interior space flows out via large windows and
doors to patios and balconies, while the views of
the surrounding countryside are admitted.
Asymmetrical facades consisting of abstracted
three-dimensional arrangements of rendered brick,
glass and concrete slabs that abut, overlap,
intersect and hover in space. No applied ornament.
Stylistic features of the Schröder House - interior
Watch this short video of the interior of the Schröder House.
Although the commentary is in Dutch, the visual information is
very useful. It shows numerous stylistic and functionalist features
of the house, including:
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the intercom system for visitors
the automated window for 2 litre milk deliveries
the central stairwell
the centripetal movement of interior space, and the
way it unfolds, dissolves, transforms and escapes
via corner windows and balconies.
the fold-away partitions of the children’s bedrooms
the upstairs folding partition that defines the passageway, doorway and interior bathroom walls
the coloured floor sections and built-in furniture
the naked central heating radiators that feature the
only curves in the entire house
the linear and three-dimensional planar aesthetic of
the entire environment.
Examples of De Stijl design by Rietveld
Above left:
Berlin Chair, 1923
Above centre: High-back Chair, 1919
Above right:
Red Blue Chair, 1918
Left:
Hanging lamp, 1920
Right:
Side table, 1923
See a short video about these here.