CHAPTER 22 - Notes

Footnote 443:

That is, Barr proposed the title _The International Style_ for the book prepared by myself and Philip Johnson to go with this Exhibition, drawing the word ‘international’ from the title of Gropius’s _Internationale Architektur_. For various reasons the name ‘International Style’ has often been castigated since 1932; yet it is still recurrently used, with or without apology, by many critics. The term is, for example, used in English and in a rather unflattering sense by Gillo Dorfles in _L’ Architettura moderna_—one chapter is entitled ‘“L’lnternational Style” ed i nuovi regionalismi’—with no indication of its origin. Since this term had rather generally acquired a pejorative meaning, I avoided using it as far as possible in this book, preferring the vaguer but less controversial phrase ‘modern architecture of the second generation’ despite its clumsiness. For the possible claim that the original meaning of ‘International Style’, as used by Barr, Johnson, and myself, still retained some validity in the early fifties, see my article ‘The “International Style” Twenty Years After’, _Architectural Record_, CX (1952), 89-97. (See Epilogue.)

Footnote 444:

See Roggero, M. F., _Il Contributo di Mendelsohn alla evoluzione dell’ architettura moderna_, Milan [1952].

Footnote 445:

See Jaffé, H. L. C., _De Stijl, 1917-1931_, London [1956], and Zevi, B., _Poetica dell’ architettura neoplastica_, Milan, 1935.

Footnote 446:

See Mendelsohn, E., _Bauten und Skizzen_, Berlin, 1923; and English ed., _Buildings and Sketches_, London, 1923.

Footnote 447:

The whole question of Expressionism in architecture is still a difficult one despite a renewed critical interest in the intentions and achievements of the architects influenced by the movement (see Note [422] to Chapter 20). As will shortly be noted, Gropius and Mies van der Rohe were both briefly affected by Expressionist concepts and used forms of distinctly Expressionist character in the years 1919-21.

Footnote 448:

An earlier Goetheanum of 1913-20, which was destroyed by fire, had been largely of wood. It was not at all like Mendelsohn’s Einstein Tower but still somewhat Art Nouveau. See Brunati and Mendini, _Steiner_, Milan [n.d.], for both versions. See also Steiner, R., _Wege zu einem neuen Baustil_, Dornach, 1926 (Eng. trans., London-New York, 1927), and _Der Baugedanke des Goetheanum_, Dornach, 1932; and Rosenkrantz, A., _The Goetheanum as a New Impulse in Art_, [London, n.d.].

Footnote 449:

For a late reassessment of that influence, see Jordan, R. F., ‘Dudok’, _Architectural Review_, CXV (1954), 237-42.

Footnote 450:

It is probable that Mendelsohn’s early projects and also the tower had some influence on the later development of ‘streamlining’ in industrial design. See Banham, R., ‘Machine-aesthetic’, _Architectural Review_, CXVII (1955), 224-8.

Footnote 451:

This sort of enclosure has come of late to be called a ‘curtain-wall’. Some of the skyscrapers of the nineties in Chicago, most notably Beman’s Studebaker Building of 1895 and Holabird & Roche’s McClurg Building of 1899, approached it very closely, yet in them the actual supporting piers remained in the façade plane as at the Fagus Factory and thus the ‘curtain’ was interrupted, not continuous horizontally. The first true example of the curtain-wall applied to a large urban structure followed within a few years after the Fagus Factory, and certainly with no influence from it; this is the Hallidie Building in San Francisco, completed by Willis Polk (1867-1924) in 1918 immediately after the First World War. But see p. 238 and Note 9 to