Out of the Display Case:
Sport at the Bauhaus

// Object Talk
Thu, 16 June, 6 pm
Bauhaus Museum Dessau
Open Stage

Even though sports only became part of the regular curriculum at the Bauhaus in Dessau from 1928 onwards, physical activities and physical exercises were part of the school's holistic program from the very beginning. This was because the Bauhaus was committed to a modern life that embraced the whole person – body, mind and soul. Therefore, it was important to strengthen the body in its inner and outer mobility and to train it in the sense of a new physical culture. Thus Johannes Itten integrated gymnastic and breathing exercises into his preliminary classes at the Bauhaus Weimar. But also in the rhythmic "harmonization theory" of Gertrud Grunow (1870-1944), relationships between tone, color and movement were explored with full physical effort. Above all, however, at the Bauhaus Dessau, sporting activities were part of everyday life. Based on archive photos, Torsten Blume (Bauhaus Dessau Foundation) gives an insight into the spectrum of what sport meant at the Bauhaus.