Reading Max Taut: Bauten und Pläne

Abstract

Published in 1927, Max Taut: Bauten und Pläne consists primarily of photographs of Taut's latest building project, the German Printers’ Union Building, built in Berlin between 1924 and 1926. It also includes a brief text by the critic Adolf Behne, in which he defines Sachlichkeit as ‘self-conscious’ architecture that generates a ‘connection of man to man'. At first glance, Behne's text seems to introduce the German Printers’ Union Building as an example of Sachlichkeit. Yet this paper will argue that it responds to the presentation of architecture in the photographic book more than to the design of Taut's building. According to Behne, modern man had become alienated from his everyday environment and Sachlichkeit calls for his empowered interaction with architecture, an experience potentially facilitated by photography. Max Taut: Bauten und Pläne testifies to the close collaboration between photography, architecture and the book in an attempt to articulate Sachlichkeit during the Weimar Republic.Because of the dynamic layout of Max Taut: Bauten und Pläne, its designer Johannes Molzahn declared it to be an example of the new hybrid media he called Buchkinema. The book attempts to reconstruct the building as seen from various points of view. Photographic sequences show the same façade from slightly different angles, recreating movement in space. Pages display views from multiple windows that convey little information about the building but allow the viewer to absorb several viewpoints simultaneously. In addition to articulating a particular conception of Sachlichkeit, Max Taut: Bauten und Pläne also exemplifies the widespread desire among theorists and practitioners of architecture during the Weimar Republic to transcend earlier conceptions of a building as a fixed or static form.