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Adolphe Appia and the Eurhythmic Promise of Hellerau

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Adolphe Appia
and the Eurhythmic Promise
of Hellerau

In the 1920s the Bauhaus stage was

a legendary modern theatre project.

by the foyer and auditorium, on the

other by the canteen, would have
been nigh inconceivable were it not
for the precedent set by the auditori-
um of the Festspielhaus Hellerau.

by
Ross Anderson

0)

Festive area of the

Bauhaus stage,
photo: Sebastian
Gündel, 2010.

94
An impromptu photograph taken
in the bright late morning light of
the Spring of 1912 captures two
companions walking briskly and
contentedly away from the very
recently completed Bildungsan-
stalt für rhythmische Erziehung
(Institute for Rhythmic Education)
in the new garden city of Hellerau
The man more central to the
dark suit over a white shirt and
tie and a smart fedora that
partially shades his face domi-
moustache. The other is more
enigmatic. He is clutching a
swollen folio of drawings and
is clad in the manner of a con-
temporary architect – wholly in
black, with a dark limp-brimmed
felt hat obscuring his full-beard-
ed face. One is the Swiss music
pedagogue and famed inventor
of eurhythmics Émile Jaques-
Dalcroze (1865–1950), the other
is the comparatively unknown
Swiss theatre reformer Adolphe
Appia (1862–1928), who once
wrote ‘anonymity is the essence
of my whole existence.’(1) In the
luminous setting of the Bildungs-
anstalt’s radically minimal
Festsaal (festival hall), accom-
modated in the stripped-back
neo-classical building that is
withdrawing into the background
of the photograph, Appia sum-
moned into being one of the
more remarkable architectural
settings of the early 20th century.
Appia’s atmospheric suite of
drawings entitled Rhythmic
Spaces - house the Bildungsanstalt, a pro-
tribution at Hellerau were moti-
vated by Jaques-Dalcroze’s
eurhythmic teachings. Singular
in achievement these drawings
should nevertheless be consid-
ered within their historical con-
text and more particularly in
relation to the notion of arrhyth-
mia that the German economist
Karl Bücher had asserted in his
Work and Rhythm (1896) was
-
ised modern industrial society.
Bücher contended that the arti- Ross
- Anderson
dustrial machinery had disrupted
the archaic rhythmic relations is a Senior Lecturer
of work and art that could be in architectural
seen to exist in the exercise of design, history and
traditional crafts. He proposed theory at the Uni-
that a rediscovery of rhythm versity of Sydney.
would usher individuals back into He completed his
healthy accord with their original PhD at the Universi-
selves and with their community. ty of Cambridge
The industrialist Karl Schmidt with a dissertation
came to share Bücher’s vision entitled From the
and sought to enact it – by Bauhütte to the
founding Hellerau in 1909 as Bauhaus, and he
a new city oriented by eurhyth- now writes on vari-
mics. ous aspects of
Modern German
Invented by Jaques-Dalcroze, architecture and
eurhythmics was described philosophy. He
- is also engaged in
od of utilising our natural in- creative practices
stincts for rhythm in the acquisi- that explore the
tion of an intimate knowledge imaginative roles
of musical construction, in the played by drawing
development of a more perfect and photography
co-ordination between mind in architectural
and body, and in the creation of representation and
a new outlet for artistic expres- reception.
sion.’(2) Jaques-Dalcroze himself
aspired ‘to raise rhythm to the
height of a social institution, and
prepare the way for a new style
… that may become the basis
for a new society.’(3) He moved to
Hellerau in 1910 to establish the
Bildungsanstalt für rhythmische
Erziehung (Institute of Rhythmic
Education) that would become a
beacon for a new bodily-spiritual
culture. The young and compar-
atively inexperienced Berlin
architect Heinrich Tessenow was
granted the intimidating commis-
sion for a building that would
ject that has come to be known
as the Hellerau Festspielhaus
(festival theatre) today. In addi-
tion to the focal Festsaal, Tesse-
now’s building was to contain
rehearsal spaces, changing and
shower rooms, and areas for
rhythmic exercises, comprising
what one critic characterised as
an amalgamation of an ancient
Greek temple and palaestra
also suggested that the Fest-
95
spielhaus would ‘replace the
missing church’ in becoming
the focal point for the new city
in the hills outside of Dresden.(4)
The perfectly symmetrical
ground plan of the Festspielhaus
(1910–1912) does indeed pres-
ent the pronounced nave, side
aisle and transept arrangement
of a church. On close examina-
tion it can be observed that
the governing dimensions have
been determined geometrically
as a ‘dance’ or ‘play’ of reverbe-
rations and divisions of a single
governing square module that
is the overall depth of the plan
in the north-south axis. The twin
foyer are square in plan and are
a quarter of the original module,
as are the rehearsal rooms to
either side of the Festsaal that
is the centrepiece of the compo-
sition. A ‘slipped’ repetition of
elongated service zones along
the eastern and western extrem-
ities of the plan. This architectur-
al play with the module that is
the ‘measure’ of the building is
entirely in accord with Jaques-
Dalcroze’s regulations for eu-
rhythmic movement of the body
to music, as explained by Mar-
garet Naumburg: ‘Note duration
is expressed by the forward
movement of the feet and the
body. A quarter note, the length
of an average step forward,
forms the unit. Eighth notes are
stepped rapidly; half the length
of the quarter note, and six-
teenth notes are so short that
they become light running
steps.’(5)
The ground plan of the rectangu-
lar Festsaal is composed as an
array of three squares that are
a third of the size of the original
module. It can be conceived of
as a kind of alchemical vessel,
invoking a special temporality –
the time out of time of ritual and
ceremony.(6) Dramatic perfor-
mances, unlike history, can be
re-enacted and therefore always
96
recall fundamental or original 1)
conditions. At Hellerau these
conditions were embodied in the Émile Jaques-
play between the dark depths of Dalcroze and
metaphorical earth and bright Adolphe Appia in
ethereal light. Hellerau, 1912.
Appia collaborated with the 2)
Russian artist Alexander von
Salzmann to fabricate an ex- Festival theatre
traordinarily innovative electric Hellerau, Festsaal
lighting apparatus to regulate (festival hall),
and temper the light in the isometry, graphic:
Festsaal. The walls and ceiling Sean Bryen, 2016.
were made of taut diaphanous
canvas screens impregnated 3)
with cedar oil. They were illumi-
nated from behind by banks Eurhythmics perfor-
of thousands of electric globes, mance during the
fashioning a ‘luminous organ’ Hellerau festival,
that enveloped the audience 1912.
in the same mysteriously diffuse
glow as the performers. The 4)
globes were cabled to a master
control console from where their Rhythmic Spaces:
intensity and distribution could The Diver, drawing:
be regulated by a single opera- Adolphe Appia,
tor. Both the audience and per- 1909/10.
formers entered the Festsaal
through tripartite doors located
in the middle of the long edges
of the hall, having mingled to-
gether in the adjacent common
areas. Stepping out onto the
-
ence took their places in the
600 simple dark chairs banked
in raked rows to the rear of the
room, while the performers took
their places opposite. The few
existing photographs of the
Festsaal in use show the brilliant
whiteness of the walls and ceil-
affectation and stripped of
proscenium, curtain, footlights,
wings, the Festsaal embodied
Appia’s ideal theatre, which was
‘only an empty room, waiting.’ (7)
Appia had repeatedly outlined
his ambition to diminish what
he saw as the abyss separating
performers and audience.
According to him traditional
theatres dulled their comfortable
audiences sitting in the semi-
darkness into a state of total
1)

2) 3)

4)

97
 Moved passivity. In Eurhythmics and the
B Theatre (1911) he pronounced:
i ‘Eurhythmics will overthrow this
o passivity! Musical rhythm will
g enter all of us, to say: you your-
r self are the work of art.’(8) He
a placed exceptional importance
p on light as the carrier of moods
h and atmosphere, particularly
i when carefully calibrated with
e music. In Eurhythmics and Light
s he wrote of ‘luminous sound …
the precise coordination of lumi-
nous vibrations in space to those
of the music.’ While proclaiming
the equal value of light and mu-
sic that were both able to spread
the harmony of their vibrations,
he thought that it was necessary
Karla Grosch in the short term for the former
to defer to the latter, since ‘al-
* 1904 Weimar though we are quite familiar with
† 1933 Tel Aviv the art of sounds, our aesthetic
understanding with regard to
Movement, sports reography. In accord light is still rather basic; so we
and games, dance with Oskar Schlem- must study light with the aid, and
and rhythm are mer, who associates under the control, of music.’(9)
in great demand; free composition
the Bauhaus aims with the idea of Appia’s own studies of light
to be a place where were initially expressed in his
the balance between Grosch dances Rhythmic Spaces drawings
body and mind is with others in stage (1909–1910) that are an enviably
achieved. Regular works such as the accomplished mix of verve and
exercise classes Glass Dance. She
is one of the few Appia had attended one of
established under female teachers Jaques-Dalcroze’s sessions at
Hannes Meyer, at the Bauhaus up the Geneva conservatory: ‘My
devised and taught to 1932. Following impressions were complex and
by the callisthenics a turbulent relation-
teacher Karla ship with an actor moved to tears, remembering
Grosch. These in Dessau and be- how long I had waited. But soon
classes are for I sensed the awakening of a new
women only; actor upheavals at the force utterly unknown to me!
Werner Siedhoff school, Grosch I was no longer in the audience,
was in charge of leaves Germany I was on the stage with the per-
the men’s physical in 1933. She dies formers.’(10) This initial enthusi-
exercise. Trained the same year while asm was tempered during a
in Dresden under swimming off the subsequent performance that
Gret Palucca, who coast of Tel Aviv. Jaques-Dalcroze had staged
was highly respected himself:
at the Bauhaus,
from 1928 Grosch ‘The result troubled me greatly,
experiments with –> and I made a decision: I took up
movement and cho- page paper and pencil and designed
108 two or three spaces for rhythmic
movements every day with fe-
Konrad Püschel verish determination. Once I had
around 20 of them I sent them
to Jaques-Dalcroze … He was

98
 greatly enthused when he saw
my drawings, and I was con-
vinced that, both for his sake
and for mine, I had brought to
realisation something convinc-
ing. The Raumstil (spatial style)
for bodily movements had been
found.’(11)
A number of the themes that are
very prevalent in Appia’s draw-
ings are equally present in the
later architecture of Le Corbusier.
Tellingly, he spent substantial
time at Hellerau during a forma-
tive time in his career. In A Study
of the Decorative Art Movement
in Germany (1912) Le Corbusier
wrote that ‘the greatest artists
of Germany’ had constructed
the extraordinary city of Hellerau,
enjoying ‘the most favourable
circumstances so that genius
might be manifest, so that artists
can produce almost total works
of art.’(12) The rich architectural
tableau atop his much later Unité
d’habitation (1952) at Marseille
can, at least in part, be charac-
terised as an embodiment of the
Appian inheritance in architec-
ture. It also reveals an alliance
with some of the deeper convic-
tions of eurhythmics in regards
to the education and healthy
physical development of children
incited by movement. At the
northern end of the rooftop he
composed an elemental open-
air theatre in cast concrete that
clearly recalls Appia’s Rhythmic
Spaces. In his evocative draw-
ings, and in the eurhythmic per-
formances at Hellerau, Appia
previewed themes that were
developed in the architecture
of Le Corbusier and others. He
remains, however, obscure and
enigmatic, much as in the photo-
graph with Jaques-Dalcroze on
their late morning stroll in 1912.
Appia was, in his own words, ‘a
wolf in his lair who gazes upon
the light which crosses his hole
… luminous – very luminous.’(13)
x de l’Art, 1912, 42, 50.
View publication stats
(1) Appia, Adolphe, letter
to Karl Reyle, September 10,
1926.
(2) Naumburg, Margaret,
‘The Dalcroze Idea: What
Eurhythmics Is and What
It Means,’ in: The Outlook,
January 17, 1914, 127.
(3) Jaques-Dalcroze, Émile,
letter to Wolf Dohrn, 1909.
(4) Martin, William, cited in
Berchtold, Alfred, ‘Émile
Jaques-Dalcroze et son
temps,’ in: Émile Jaques-
Dalcroze: L’Homme, le Com-
positeur, le Créateur de la
Rythmique, ed. Frank Martin,
Neuchatel: Eds de la Bacon-
nière, 1965, 88.
(5) Naumburg, Margaret:
‘The Dalcroze Idea’, 127.
Note that Tessenow met with
Jaques-Dalcroze and Appia on
a number of occasions in that
year to discuss his plans for
the building.
(6) See Gadamer, Hans-Georg
‘Über die Festlichkeit des
Theaters,’ in: Mannheimer
Hefte, III, 1954, 26–30.
(7) Appia, Adolphe, ‘Art Vivant
ou Nature Morte,’ Wendingen,
1922. Published in English
as ‘Living Art or Frozen Na-
ture,’ in: Players Magazine 33:4
(1962), 126.
(8) Appia, Adolphe, ‘Die rhy th-
mische Gymnastik und das
Theater,’ in: Der Rhythmus,
1911, 129.
(9) Appia, Adolphe, ‘La gym-
nastique rythmique et la
lumiere,’ in: Le Rythme, Vol.
34, December 1932, published
in English as ‘Eurhythmics
and Light’ in: Richard C.
Beachem, Adolphe Appia:
Artist and Visionary of the
Modern Theatre, Chur, Swit-
zerland: Harwood Academic
Publishers, 1994, 96.
(10) Appia, Adolphe, untitled
manuscript, 1921, cited in:
Richard C. Beacham, Adolphe
Appia, 74.
(11) Appia, Adolphe, cited
in Edmund Stadler, ‘Jaques-
Dalcroze et Adolphe Appia,’
in: Émile Jaques-Dalcroze,
418.
(12) Le Corbusier, Étude Sur
Le Mouvement D’Art Décoratif
En Allemagne, Chaux-de-
Fonds, Switzerland: Ecole
(13) Appia, Adolphe, letter
to Gordon Craig, February 8,
1916.
99