International studio (15.1901/1902(1902))

Artists Colony at Darmstadt

‘‘ VASES

BY PETER BEHRENS

I am not greatly enamoured of the gentleman’s
room, which is in violet-japanned poplar wood.
The effeminate tone and the monotonously linear
ornamentation are, to my mind, displeasing. The
bath-room, with its walls in mosaics, deserves a
word of praise.

The space on the attic floor has been most
cleverly utilised. The lining of the ceilings, the flcor
boards and furniture, being all made of the same
material (natural pine), harmonise very well.

After this somewhat bald description of Professor
Peter Behrens’ house, it would be well to hear
what the artist himself has to say about his inten-
tions. He remarks—

“ Architecture is the art of building, and
comprises in its name two ideas : the mastery
of the practical, and the art of the beautiful.
There is something exhilarating in being able
to combine in one word the two ideas—that of
practical utility and that of abstract beauty—
which unfortunately have too often been opposed
to each other. But we have left that time behind
us, and we may affirm with satisfaction that the
indications of conciliation are becoming more
pronounced. The practical object does not
seem to be any longer entirely subservient
to mere utility, but combines therewith a
certain degree of pleasure. Efforts were made
formerly to relieve the bareness of every-day
utility by embellishing it, adding ornaments to
plain, serviceable objects, and hiding the mere
prosaic purpose. The object was often loaded
with unnecessary, purposeless additions, and thus
lost all its value. In other respects, too, these
superfluous additions had a detrimental effect;

people no longer felt and perceived the practical
utility of the object, and thus the desire to use it
was decreased. Then came the realisation of the
physical pleasure existing in the useful and the
suitable, and by degrees people wanted to see the
intention, to observe the suitability of things.
They advanced further, and laid stress on the
purpose and the construction; made them more
prominent, and produced forms which invited use;
and finally arrived at the point of logical obser-
vation in its artistic aspect. This development of
artistic perception, combined with the progress
made in our technique and the newly discovered
materials, is at once a guarantee of the fertility of
the modern style and its justification. Thus we
shall now be able, owing to the combination of the
two ideas of art, to speak of architecture corres-
ponding in the highest degree with the spirit

of the time.”.“In the house

erected by myself, I was constrained by local
conditions to confine the area of the ground
plan to the utmost possible extent, and, on
the other hand, compelled to provide the rooms
required for the accommodation of an average
family. On that account the rooms had to be
arranged in a way providing for convenient inter-
communication between the rooms belonging
together by reason of the purpose they served.
My idea was that members of the family should
have the opportunity of being together or retiring
into privacy, just as they pleased. This was effected
by a system of constructing rooms of various
dimensions. In order that the music room—really
the principal apartment of the house—should be
loftier than the rooms surrounding it, it was neces-

29