Aug 18, 08:52 pm
Bauhaus legacy and Dubai
George’s interview published in The National, UAE newspaper, July 2009
...far from being a mid-century phenomenon, the Bauhaus heritage lives on. As George Katodrytis, the associate professor of architecture at the American University of Sharjah (AUS) says, the movement’s most significant legacy was the way it used technology to transform design in the 20th century from a decorative and individually crafted art to industrially produced objects and modernist buildings. “It produced utility and everyday artefacts and addressed a large audience. New styles of designed objects and buildings were created, with novel, simplified and refined forms. Utility gained an aesthetic value. It opened new possibilities for experimentation and abstraction in both art and architecture.”
...and Katodrytis singles out Dubai’s World Trade Centre: “It is an elegant high-rise building. Buildings of that period [the 1970s] were clear statements of modernism, commissioned by the Ruler to reposition the city and look at the future, yet relating to their environment.”
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