- The pedagogical approach to education at the Bauhaus
is the cornerstone of most art and design schools today.
The 19th century practice of copying the work
of the previous generation,
sitting in the Louvre, painting the Mona Lisa,
was replaced with a more collaborative
studio based approach.
The Bauhaus' goal as an educational institution
was to unite art, design, social needs, and technology.
All students began with a strict course
on design fundamentals in form, color and shape.
They then studied individual media and approaches.
The same is true today, the only change is the media.
Rather than metal, glass and printmaking,
a student today studies typography,
interaction design, motion and strategy.
Although the Bauhaus abandoned many of the practices
of the old academic traditions of art education,
it stressed intellectual and theoretical pursuits.
Design was not simply about form.
Function, meaning, and relation to society
were linked to practical skills, crafts, and techniques.
The day to day life of a student was closer to
an apprenticeship or trade training
than the lone artist exploring personal angst in an attic.
Fine art, design, and craft came together
with a goal of solving contemporary problems
for the everyday man and woman
in a modern industrial society.
This effectively leveled the old hierarchy of the arts.
Rather than painting and sculpture,
the fine arts, the only true art forms,
now design, craft, and industrial production
was on the same level.
This leveling of the field also produced
the ongoing argument continuing today: is design art?
The Bauhaus pedagogy allowed generations of designers
to transcend the boundaries of design,
not being an art form, but only a service
to industry and business.
The stress on experimentation and problem solving
at the Bauhaus is one of the largest contributions
to art and design.
Design is considered less as an adjunct of the humanities,
like literature or history,
and more similar to research science.
Ideas were explored, deconstructed,
tested and validated with others.
The design process followed a path
of iterations and refinements on a logical progression.
There are very few design educators today
that would assign a project to do something meaningless,
irrelevant and purely based on pretty ascetics.
The values of the Bauhaus from form following function,
collaboration, skill with the handmade,
and machine processes,
and the connection to the broader society,
are ingrained into virtually every design assignment today.