Die Stahlkirche
Berlin: Furche-Kunstverlag, 1928. First book form edition. Softcover. Small Quarto. 29 (1)pp., 26 plates (4 in color). Original wraps with modern two-color design and typography, black lettering on cover, orange on spine, protected in modern mylar. Protestant (Evangelical) Religious Architecture at the Pressa, Cologne 1928. Foreword by Otto Bartning, a known German architect and theoretician specialized in churches. Cover design and typography by Otto Dorfner. First published in "Stahl überall," the advertising monthly.
Bartning was a member of the German Werkbund and collaborated with Gropius to conceptualize the idea and program of the Bauhaus. Though he did not participate in the founding of the Bauhaus, he taught at the architecture school in Weimar after the Bauhaus had moved to Dessau. His international break -through came with the construction of the glass and steel church on the exhibition grounds of the 1928 Pressa in Cologne, conceived as a construction set and serving as the exhibition pavilion for the German Protestant Church during the Pressa. It was seen as a architectural statement that showed the will of the church to adapt to modernity, not to speak of the placement of this church vis à vis the famous Cologne Dome. Due to the economic hardships of most German parishes, there were no takers for the church and it was given without charges to the Protestant parish in Essen.
Originally published earlier that year in the 8th issue of the German monthly "Stahl überall," the book contains an essay by pastor Paul Girkon on the problems of Protestant church design in view of the Protestant doctrine and its solution in the design of the steel church, an expert opinion of the heating system of the church, and a contribution of the structural design of the church by the two Berlin engineers Kuhn and Schaim, including architectural plans. Illustrated with 26 plates of striking photographs by H. Schmölz and J. Josuweck showing the construction, the exterior and interior of the church, four of them in color. Text in German. Wraps with minor wear along edges, light rubbing, age-toning and small stains on front cover. Minor stains on back cover. Light foxing at top edge of block. Wraps in overall good+, interior in very good condition. g+ to vg. Item #48954
Price: $500.00