LECTURE 9 - DE STJIL AND

EXPRESSIONISM ARCHITECTURE

HISTORY AND THEORY IN ARCHITECTURE

MOHAMAD FAIRUZ ZABADI BIN SHAHRUM
 DE STIJL

Dutch pronunciation for “The Style”.

• Also known as “Neoplasticism”
• It is a Dutch artistic movement
founded in Amsterdam in 1917.
• Founded by two pioneers of abstract art,
Piet Mondrian and Theo Van Doesburg with cooperation Theo Van Doesburg

of Several artists and Architects.

• De Stijl had a profound influence on the development
both of abstract art and modern architecture and design.
• Influence still remained on architecture long
after 1931. (Van Doesburg's death).

Piet Mondrian
• influenced by Cubist painting as well as by the mysticism
and the ideas about "ideal" geometric forms.

• Also influenced by Neopositivism.

(Style of abstract painting that used only
vertical and horizontal lines with the
spaces filled in black, white, grey,
and primary colours.)

• Posited the fundamental principle

of the geometry of the straight
line, the square, and the rectangle,
combined with asymmetricality.
• Predominantly used pure
primary colours with black and white.
 FEATURES AND CHARACTERISTICS

• Asymmetry, geometric forms,white or gray

walls with details highlighted by primary colors.

• Compositions generally emphasize the separation

of planes, the application of primary colors, and
the spatial relationship of solids to voids.

• Rectangular shapes define the geometric

repetition of windows, doors, and blocks of color.

• Window sizes vary on an individual building

from large to small. They may be arranged in
patterns or one unit on a large wall.

• Flat roofs are typical, and distinctly

different from other structures.
 CASE STUDY
Rietveld Schröder House
• Also known as the Schröder House in Utrecht built in 1924 by Dutch architect Gerrit Rietveld.
• Best known examples of De Stijl-architecture
• The facades are a collage of planes and line’s components are purposely detached from, and seem to glide
past, one another.
• Surfaces are in white and shades of grey, black window and doorframes, and a number of linear elements
in primary colours.
• The rectilinear lines and planes flow from outside to inside, with the same colour palette and surfaces.
• The foundations and the balconies were made out of concrete.
• Walls were made of brick and plaster.
• The window frames and doors were made from wood as well as the floors, which were supported by
wooden beams.
• To support the building, steel girders with wire mesh were used.
INTERIOR DESIGN AND FURNITURE
EXPRESSIONISM
 History

• Developed in Northern Europe during the first decades of the 20th century.
• The architects were influenced by the political and social problems.

•
There are two buildings that are identified Expressionist .

Bruno Taut's Glass Pavilion of the Cologne Erich Mendelsohn's Einstein Tower in Potsdam,
Werkbund Exhibition (1914) Germany (1921)
Characteristics

- DISTORTION OF FORM FOR AN

EMOTIONAL EFFECT

DESCRIPTION : the Louis Vuitton Foundation takes

the form of a sailboat among the trees of the Bois
de Boulogne in Paris.

"I was trying to express emotion," he explains. "The curves were from
the fish — were a sense of movement with inert materials, which the
Greeks did, the Indian cultures did it. We're living in a culture, in a time
where movement is pervasive. Everything is moving. And so if we hook
onto that and use it as part of our language, our architectural language,
there's some resonance for it."
 -Profusion of works on paper, and models,
with discovery and representations
of concepts more important than pragmatic
finished products.

Most of frank gehry’s work are

one of
The simplest drawing and not
too many pragmatic finished
Product.

Meaning of pragmatic :

dealing with things

sensibly and realistically in
a way that is based on
practical rather than
theoretical considerations.
Example of pragmatic works
 - Themes of natural romantic phenomena,
such as caves, mountains, lightning, crystal
and rock formations. As such it is more mineral
and elemental than florid and organic which
characterized its close contemporary art
nouveau.

Pionen – White Mountain by AF-L (A), Sweden

Though a movement in Europe, expressionism
is as eastern as western. It draws as much
from Moorish, Islamic, Egyptian, and Indian art
and architecture as from Roman or Greek.
Materials in Expressionism
 Concrete

Einstein Tower in Potsdam Berlin

Wood

Brick

Amsterdam School
Expressionist Architects

Guggenheim Museum Bilbao

Frank Gehry
Le Corbusier

Sydney Opera House

Jorn Utzon
Notre Dame Du
Haut

TWA Flight
Eero Saarinen Center
SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE, Australia

65m

183m
Inspired by
Materials

Reinforced
concrete

Steel cable
wire

Tinted Glass with

Steel Framre

Glossy white &

cream tiles
Interior

Pink Granite Tiles

Timber

Plywood
 Guggenheim Museum Bilbao
Materials
include:

 Titanium
Located in Spain  Glass The Puppy by Jef Koons
 Limestone
Museum of
modern and
contemporary
art

Designed by
It reminiscent of fish scale
Frank Gehry
Maman by Louise Bourgeois

Very rare, vast and anomalous

Interior
 THANK YOU

School of Science & Engineering Polytechnic Brunei