“The challenge for us is to build a Bauhaus museum in the tradition of this unique school of design. But which architecture is the right one for this building project now, in the 21st century? With the open international tender we have successfully included numerous architecture offices worldwide in this discourse. We now have two winners of the 1st Prize. The design from Barcelona amplifies the architectural language of the Bauhaus of the 1920s. By contrast, the New York design addresses the themes of stage, painting and textile art.” (Claudia Perren, Director of the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation)
To have two 1st Prize winners in an architecture competition in not unusual. It is now a question of examining in greater depth the very different conceptual approaches of the two prize winners until it is clear with which office the new Bauhaus Museum will be built. The negotiations to this end will occur in the near future and will involve both 1st Prize winners.
The competition jury included renowned experts representing their own highly individual perspectives. Besides Wolfgang Lorch and representatives of the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation and the national, federal and municipal governments, it included among others Guido Hager (landscape architect, Zurich), Regine Leibinger (architect, Berlin), Jürgen Mayer H. (architect, Berlin), Ralf Niebergall (architect, Magdeburg), Gesche Grabenhorst (architect, Hanover) and Chris Dercon (Director of the Tate Modern, London).
Published excerpts from the written adjudications of the competition entries note that the architects González Hinz Zabala (Roberto González Peñalver, José Zabala Rojí, Anne Katharina Hinz) from Barcelona, Spain with the landscape architect Roser Vives de Delás, likewise from Barcelona, wish to revive the Bauhaus Museum “as iconographic heritage” in the sense of “less is more”. A glazed entrance area should mediate between city life and city park and welcome visitors. A glass enclosure right round the building should provide “maximum curatorial freedom” and further “the intention of the Bauhaus to be an open school”. According to the jury, the museum building is a “means to express activity and productivity, creativity and social interaction”.
The New York architecture office Young & Ayata (Michael Young, Kutan Ayata) with landscape architect Misako Murata (New York, USA) see the building as an “open collective”, as an “autonomous building that becomes a new point of reference in the heterogeneous cityscape”. The “high recognition factor” of the building itself was deemed particularly praiseworthy. Parallels with the approaches of the Bauhaus are found in diverse references which the architects have “convincingly defined”, thereby creating a “powerful, courageous, fascinating and forward-looking architectural testimony to the 21st century that “leaves its own mark””.
It will be interesting to see which architecture office will realise its design in Dessau. For further information see Stiftung Bauhaus Dessau.