The Deutscher Werkbund was founded in 1907 as a coalition of artists, craftspeople, and industrialists. It developed a language of form that remained modern until today, a language that corresponded with the demands of industrialized production processes in the beginning of the twentieth century. The quality insignia »Made in Germany« was born.
The Bauhaus, still recognized throughout the world as a leading authority for classical modernism, was founded by Deutscher Werkbund members. After World War II, decisive design positions were formulated at the design school, Hochschule für Gestaltung in Ulm. Even today, such world-renowned institutions as the Hochschule für Gestaltung Karlsruhe and the ZKM I Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe, occasionally called the »Digital Bauhaus,« are based on the intellectual tradition of the Deutscher Werkbund.

The anniversary »100 Years Werkbund« and »10 Years ZKM in Hallenbau A« both occur in 2007. The »Digital Bauhaus« ZKM presents an appropriate site to visibly express the connection between these two institutions. On the occasion of the festivities for »100 Years of the Werkbund,« showcased above all will be processes of social transformation in the past and present, and their effects on the design of our living environment. Interventions in the form of readings will lend a nostalgic glance back at the last 100 years, which will also be reflected in the evening’s fare of the century, with meals typical of the times.
 

Conference Program

Fri, December 07, 2007

6:00 p.m. Opening words from Peter Weibel ZKM | Karlsruhe and Klaus Lehmann Deutscher Werkbund

6:30 p.m. Hermann Glaser TU Berlin
Festival speech: »Schöne Form und gutes Leben? Von der Dialektik der ästhetischen Erziehung des Menschen« (Beautiful form and a good life? On the dialectics of aesthetic education)

7:30 p.m. Alfred Frei FH Merseburg »Gute Form und gutes Essen« (Good form and good food), historical buffet

10:00 p.m. Encounters

08 December 2007, Sat

10:00 a.m. Welcome by Peter Weibel ZKM | Karlsruhe and Klaus Lehmann Deutscher Werkbund
10:15 a.m. Lutz Fügener Hochschule für Gestaltung, Technik und Wirtschaft Pforzheim
»Funktion und Emotion – Beispiel Automobil« (Function and emotion, the car as example)

11:00 a.m. Intervention 1 »Erziehung zur neuen Sachlichkeit und die ewige Unsachlichkeit der Menschen« (New Objectivity education and the eternal non-objectivity of people)

11:15 a.m. Jochen Wagner Evangelische Akademie Tutzing
»Mythos Topform und das Ideal des Kaputten. Schönes, Gutes, Wahres einmal anders« (The myth of top form and the ideal of the non-functional. A twist on beautiful, good, and true)

12:00 p.m. Intervention 2 »Was ist schön im Werkbund?« (What is beautiful at the Werkbund?)

12:15 p.m. Break

1:30 p.m. Peter Weibel ZKM | Karlsruhe
»Das Virtuelle im Realen: Von der Möglichkeitsform« (The virtual in reality: on the form of possibility)

2:00 p.m. Wolfgang Ullrich HfG | Karlsruhe
»Fiktion als Funktion.Von Dingen, die den Alltag überhöhen« (Fiction as function, on things that surpass the everyday)

2:30 p.m. Intervention 3 »Der Werkbund und der Internationale Stil« (Deutscher Werkbund and International Style)

2:45 p.m. Peter Sloterdijk HfG | Karlsruhe »Die Oberfläche« (The surface)

3:15 p.m. Gernot Böhme TU Darmstadt »Die Atmosphäre« (The atmosphere)

3:45 Intervention 4 »Die Dinge des Werkbundes. Vom Sofakissen bis zum Städtebau« (Werkbund objects: From the sofa cushion to urban design)

4:00 p.m. Break

4:30 p.m. Vittorio Magnago-Lampugnani ETH Zurich
»Die neue Einfachheit, vierzehn Jahre später« (New Simplicity, fourteen years later)

5:00 p.m. Intervention 5 »Zur Dialektik des Einfachen« (On the dialectics of the simple)

5:15 p.m. Gerhard Schulze Universität Bamberg
»Fortuna und Felicitas. Der hinkende Gang der Moderne« (Fortuna and Felicitas: Modernity’s limping gait)

Organization / Institution

ZKM