With his Triadic Ballet (premiered in 1922), the Stuttgart-born artist Oskar Schlemmer created an exceptionally complex work that is now, along with the painting “Bauhaustreppe” (1932), one of the best-known works of classical modernism. Moving beyond mainstream art, which Schlemmer had already interpreted as that dead end in which contemporary art appears to be trapped, he pursued undeterred the opposite direction of a timeless and universal “grand style” that can only emerge from a serendipitous combination of tradition and innovation. Based on the Triadic Ballet, he developed a three-step design principle, which from then on was to define all his work. This study presents in the first instance a coherent overview of Schlemmer’s oeuvre. It does not focus, as is usually the case, on art history or theatre studies, but connects both fields of research and includes both musicological studies and aspects of literary history. This new, broad perspective demonstrates that Schlemmer must be considered a style reformer far surpassing the contemporary art revolution, whose agenda has again become hugely relevant, especially to the contemporary practice of art.
384 pages, Rombach Verlag KG; 2nd edition, revised (11 April 2014), ISBN-10: 3793097676, ISBN-13: 978-3793097679, € 64,00
