Page 27 - Studio International - September October 1975

form, thus achieving the twentieth- designed in 1917, is a heavy-handed stimulating qualities of sophisticated
century artists' grand vision of placing version of the stripped down 'Cubism' materials, the limpidity of glass, the
man within the painting instead of in of Loos and Josef Hoffman, while in his shine and roundness of finish, lustrous
front of it.'10 design for a factory at Purmerend in 1919 and shining colours, the glitter of steel.'
The Aubette interiors, therefore, one façade, with its juxtaposition of Such architecture, he admitted, was
represent the culmination of Van horizontals and verticals, recalls the work `more bound to matter than ever before,'
Doesburg's personal vision of of Vantongerloo and Huszar. Only three but in appearance he believed it would
architecture, in which space is broken of his designs, however, are overtly `rise clear of material considerations' and
down and recreated or re-expressed influenced by De Stijl painting, and in the 'fullness of light, brought to purity
through a dynamic use of colour. And these are the project for the sea-side of form and colour' surpass 'in its freedom
it is ironic that this unique, terrace at Scheveningen (1917), the from inessentialism . even classical
idiosyncratic and yet within Van Oud-Mathensee building shed (1923) purity.'''
Doesburg's terms of reference, totally and the Café de Unie (1924). Oud The terminology echoes that of
logical experiment was being completed described the first and the most Berlage as well as L'Esprit Nouveau, and
while J. J. P. Oud, a founder but by that ambitious of these projects as being emphasizes the links between the
time renegade member of the inspired by Cubism, although its nineteenth and twentieth-century
movement, was contributing to the articulation of standard units is more architectural traditions, links which in
formalisms of Weissenhof. For while reminiscent of the contemporary Holland were strengthened by the
De Stijl theories helped to form the painting of Huszar, Van der Leck and progressive nature of nineteenth-century
dogmas of the International Style, it is Mondrian, and indeed recalls in its theory and practice, especially in social
significant that most Dutch dependence on the form-giving housing. For the precedents established
architects disassociated themselves from properties of light and shadow by Berlage influenced the expressionist
Van Doesburg's ideologies when faced Mondrian's seminal 'plus and minus' forms of the Amsterdam estates of the
with the practical problems of designing paintings at the same resort. In plan, 1920s as well as confirming the
houses, suburbs and cities. By 1922 however, the terrace remains disciplines of Oud: disciplines which
Van t'Hoff, Wils and Oud had all left the were to be subsequently destroyed and
movement, and Oud himself, as city travestied by their pale imitations in
architect to Rotterdam, was evolving new commercial practice.
formal concepts to apply to the problem of The De Stijl influence on architectural
mass housing. developments in Holland was most
Oud's experience is interesting, acceptable when it was absorbed by more
however, in that it demonstrates De Stijl pragmatic architects who tempered its
as a transitional, but formative phase in refinements and abstraction with the
the evolution of the International Style. traditional and humanistic concerns for
He had a sound practical training at an material, scale, variety and texture :
Arts and Crafts School and School of Jan Wils' 1919 Papaverhof housing estate
Draughtsmanship in Amsterdam and at J. J. P. Oud in the Hague, for example, is now
Site Office 1923
Delft Technical University before the mellowed by use and vegetation, and
first World War, and spent a brief time in conventional, and the manager's hut for Dick Greiner's so called 'concrete village'
Munich working with Theodor Fischer the Oud-Mathensee estate which Oud (Watergraafsmeer) on the outskirts of
while the latter was helping to formulate was then planning, is far more playful Amsterdam, commenced in 1921, is also
the policies of the German Werkbund. and imaginative. Like Van Doesburg's humanized by variations of form, detail
His training in the Berlagian tradition of Weimar blocks, the building was designed and scale, as well as by the inclusion
direct structural expression and social to express spatial volume; it stood on a within the scheme of traditional brick
purpose, therefore, had been reinforced white plinth, and the separate 'volumes,' housing by G. Versteeg (who had worked
by his experience in Germany, and his their geometry emphasized by surface with Berlage). And the example of
early work expresses the positive and articulation, were painted in primary
energetic forms of both the Dutch and the colours. In the Café de Unie, too, which
German Arts and Crafts Movements. survived until the bombing of
Like Van t'Hoff and Mondrian, however, Rotterdam in 1940, colour, texture and
he returned to Holland at the outbreak of graphics played games with form. Oud,
war; he met Van Doesburg in 1915 when however, would only permit games in
they were both living in Leiden, and his these temporary or 'façade' structures,
interest in avant-garde painting — Cubism for his appointment as city architect to
and Futurism as well as the Dutch Rotterdam in 1918, a year after he had
experiments — seems to have developed joined the De Stijl movement,
during this period. He knew Vilmos concentrated his attention on sterner
Huszar, who was living in nearby social priorities which were to be
Voorburg; and Van t'Hoff, who had been expressed in shining materials and formal
working in America for the past two years, rather than spatial abstractions. Unlike Jan Wils
introduced him to the work of Frank Van Doesburg, Oud was concerned with Papaverhof 1919
Lloyd Wright — an experience which the purity rather than the
both confirmed and challenged his dematerialization of form. He wished to Dudok, of course, in Hilversum,
assumptions about the nature of create an essentially man-made demonstrates how abstract and
architecture. For while Wright shared environment which demonstrated the geometrical forms become lyrical and
Berlage's concern for the expressive puritan virtues of order, economy, romantic when expressed in the subtle,
nature of materials, his architecture efficiency and cleanliness; and in harmonious colours of glazed and
demonstrated an extension rather than achieving this vision the practical, natural brick. Such overt references to
enclosure of space, and so could, in one symbolic and expressive nature of earlier and discredited traditions,
important respect, be associated with the materials, in the Berlagian and however, were not acceptable to the
ideas then being explored by the Wrightian sense, preoccupied him far De Stijl canon as formulated by Van
European abstract painters. more than they did Van Doesburg the Doesburg, which became increasingly
In response to these new influences, artist, whose abstraction was concerned concerned with the elementarist
however, Oud abandoned the tactile and with space rather than with matter. demonstration of the relationship of
telluric qualities of both Berlage and Nevertheless Oud obviously felt the matter to space; and the second
Wright and concentrated on the need to justify his `materialism'; in `international' generation of De Stijl,
expression and articulation of abstract Holländische Architektur, for example, enlisted by Van Doesburg in the mid-
forms derived, it seems, from both fine which was published by the Bauhaus in twenties, included experimentalists
art and architectural sources. The Villa 1926, he describes his vision of such as Lissitsky and Kiesler rather than
Allegonda at Katwijk, for example, architecture as 'unfolding the practising architects.

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