Beyond Bauhaus and László Moholy-Nagy in Britain - two exhibitions at RIBA

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On the centenary of the Bauhaus school, one of the most famous and influential design schools in modern history, two exhibitions at RIBA in London look afresh at the birth of Modernism in Britain.

Beyond Bauhaus - Modernism in Britain 1933 to 1966

The 1930s were a pivotal decade for British avantgarde architecture. Despite the relative paucity of modernist buildings being commissioned, by 1937 the country had, for a brief moment, become the epicentre of progressive contemporary architecture in Europe.

This exhibition revisits the impact of three notable Bauhaus émigrés: Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer and László Moholy-Nagy. Centred on the brief period of 1934-37, when they came to live and work in Britain, it traces this fertile moment in British architectural history and considers where its legacy has had the most enduring impact.

Drawing on the RIBA’s unique and world-class collections, little known and rarely shown works by the three ex-Bauhaus tutors will be displayed alongside works by young British architects practising at the time, including Maxwell Fry, FRS Yorke, Mary Crowley, Leslie Martin and Sadie Speight.

House in Ferriby by Leslie Martin and Sadie Speight, 1935 / RIBA Collections

László Moholy-Nagy in Britain: Between the New Vision and the New Bauhaus

László Moholy-Nagy was one of the most innovative artists and thinkers of the first half of the twentieth century. In 1937, following his former Bauhaus colleague Walter Gropius, he emigrated to Britain, where he spent two intense years filled with commissions, collaborations and artistic exchanges, before finally moving to the United States.

This display focuses on a little known period of the artist’s career and includes an extensive selection of his British work, mostly drawn from the RIBA’s own world famous collections and showcasing rarely seen photographs and examples of his graphic design projects.

The content of the display has been curated to complement the exhibition above.

Architectural Press Archive /RIBA Collections

Time: 1 October 2019 to 1 February 2020,Monday to Saturday: 10am to 5pm, Tuesday: 10am to 8pm, free exhibition

Address: Architecture Gallery, RIBA, 66 Portland Place, London W1B 1AD

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