The Study of Visual Characteristics of the Most Significant Graphic Design Works of the Bauhaus School

The Bauhaus school was one of the pioneers of modern art in the years 1919 to 1933 in Germany. A school of architecture and applied arts that worked on various fields of art and design. Bauhaus played an important role in nurturing artists and was famous for the approach to design that it publicized. One of the main objectives of the Bauhaus was to unify art, craft, and technology, and this approach was incorporated into the curriculum of the school. Bauhaus, which means “house of construction” in German literature, existed for a period of fourteen years in three German cities (Weimar from 1919 to 1925, Dessau from 1925 to 1932 and Berlin from 1932 to 1933), under three different architect-directors: Walter Gropius from 1919 to 1928, Hannes Meyer from 1928 to 1930 and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe from 1930 until 1933, when the school was closed by its own leadership under pressure from the Nazi-led government. After closing the school, one of the teachers named Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, made efforts to continue the Bauhaus way by establishing the “New Bauhaus” school in Chicago, the United States, which was, however, closed only a year after it was opened, in 1938. In Bauhaus teaching, the theory and practical workshops were taught together. Practical issues were taught in workshops of different fields of art and design. Some workshops were related to graphic design such as commercial art workshops (including advertising and typography), bookbinding workshops, and printing workshops. Graphic works were produced by students, artists and craftsmen, often to meet the graphic and printing needs of the school. According to Hans Wingler, German scholar and author of several books about the Bauhaus, Bauhaus graphic services, printing and advertising was a pioneer in its time. Wingler’s view seems to be right as in the second and third decades of the twentieth century, graphic design in its present form was standing at the beginning of its way. The Bauhaus graphic works in its time were remarkable and impressive in diversity and creativity to the extent that they served as the inspiration to a significant number of graphic works in this century. This article introduces visual characteristics of the most significant graphic design works of the Bauhaus in various fields, including school’s stamp design, typeface design, cover design, layout, poster, brochure, environmental graphic design, printing and bookbinding, greeting card, invitation card, and official paper design. These works have been collected using secondary resources. The analytical investigation of the works reveals their most common features and characteristics to be the use of lowercase Latin letters, design and use of sans-serif letters, printed primary colors, geometry, and photography, creation of asymmetric and non-decorative order, and use of grid in layout. The graphic design and style prominent in the works of Bauhaus school led to important achievements in the field of new typography and facilitated the rise of modern graphic design movements such as Swiss style in poster design, which is also in use.