The ideological sources of Mies van der Rohe's architecture. Comments on the publication of Letters from Lake Como by Romano Guardini
Creators: name: Wąs, Cezary
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2023
Subjects: Romano Guardini; Ludwig Mies van der Rohe; modernism in architecture; theories in architecture

description: A collection of nine letters from the Catholic theologian Romano Guardini to his friend Fr. Josef Weiger was published in 1927. In Ludwig Mies van der Rohe’s library of several hundred items, it was a book that he used to formulate the basic principles of his own architecture. The aim of the paper is to present the content of Guardini’s book and its influence on the views and work of Mies van der Rohe. The architect’s insightful monographs, especially the book by Fritz Neumeyer, accurately document the relationship between the theologian’s statements and attempts to adapt them to the theory of architecture. The more recent analysis of these relationships presented in the article leads to the conclusion that Mies van der Rohe set himself the task of finding a pure spirit in the world of pure abstractions. His creative involvement was a form of contemplating and developing forces which, although contained in nature or technology, can also be considered transcendent.
description: preprint
description: {"references": ["Birksted, J.K. (2009), Le Corbusier and the Occult, Cambridge (MA): MIT Press.", "Freigang, Ch. (2018), 'Mies van der Rohe, der Werkbund und die Frage der Technik um 1930', RIHA Journal, Special Issue: Mies und mehr\u2026 Transferprozesse in Architektur und Wohnkultur der 1920er und 1930er Jahre, 186. Available at: https://journals.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/index.php/rihajournal/article/view/70240/65862, DOI: https://doi.org/10.11588/riha.2018.1.70240 (accessed: 14.06.2022).", "Guardini, R. (1950), Das Ende der Neuzeit. Ein Versuch zur Orientierung, Basel: He\u00df Verlag.", "Guardini, R. (1956), The End of the Modern World: A Search for Orientation, transl. by Theman, J. and Burke, H., New York: Sheed &amp; Ward.", "Guardini, R. (1969), Koniec czas\u00f3w nowo\u017cytnych, Krak\u00f3w: Znak.", "Guardini, R. (1994), Letters from Lake Como: Explorations on Technology and Human Race, transl. by Bromiley, G.W., Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.", "Heidegger, M. (1938), 'Die Zeit des Weltbildes', [published in:] Heidegger, M., Gesamtausgabe. I. Abteilung: Ver\u00f6ffentlichte Schriften 1910\u20131976, vol. 5: Holzwege, Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann, 1977.", "Heidegger M., (1946), 'Brief \u00fcber den \u00abHumanismus\u00bb', [published in:] Heidegger, M., Gesamtausgabe. I. Abteilung: Ver\u00f6ffentlichte Schriften 1910\u20131976, vol. 9: Wegmarken, Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann, 1976.", "Heidegger, M. (1995), 'List o humanizmie', transl. by Tischner, J., [in:] Heidegger, M., Znaki drogi, Warszawa: Fundacja Aletheia.", "Heidegger M. (1997), 'Czas \u015bwiatobrazu', transl. by Wolicki, K., [in:] Drogi lasu, Warszawa: Fundacja Aletheia.", "Mart\u00ednez de Guere\u00f1u, L. (2011), '\u00abAbstraktion\u00bb. Lectura en dos tiempos: Romano Guardini y Mies van der Rohe', Revisiones: Revista de cr\u00edtica cultural, 7, pp. 85\u2013100.", "Mertins, D. (2014), Mies, London\u2013New York: Phaidon Press.", "Neumeyer, F. (1991), The Artless Word: Mies van der Rohe on the Building Art, transl. by Jarzombek, M., Cambridge (Mass.): MIT Press."]}