By: gereon sievernich, director, Martin-Gropius-Bau Berlin

gereon sievernich, director, Martin-Gropius-Bau Berlin — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 20:01:35 +0000

Dear Mr.Krone,
we feel very sad. Walter Gropius is one of the most important architects. All his buldings in Germany were declared landmarks long time ago. I work in a building, which was erected by a great uncle of Walter Gropius. This is why my museum is named Martin-Gropius-Bau (www.gropiusbau.de). In the sixties, when in Berlin many old buildings were on the lists to be destroyed, Walter Gropius, coming from the USA to Berlin (West), saved the building in telling the mayor not to destroy it.
We do not understand what is going on in Chicago. And next door to the Michael Reese Complex the famous buildings of Mies van der Rohe are situated. What a unique situation.
Our recent Bauhaus-Exhibition in the Martin-Gropius-Bau in Berlin attracted 170.000 visitors. They all wanted to see, what the founder of the Bauhaus – Walter Gropius – did for this famous school, of which later Mies was the last director, before the nazis closed the school. Gropius and Mies both found save haven in the USA after 1936.
The exhibtion “Bauhaus-Workshop of Modernity, which actually is being presented in the MoMA in New York (because of the 80th anniversary of the MoMA), gives insight view of what Walter Gropius did, before he was forced to leave germany.
By the way: I did write to Your Mayor and got a very nice response, but only to the Bauhaus-Catalogue I sent.
Let me know if we can be of any help
best regards
Gereon Sievernich

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By: gereon sievernich, director, Martin-Gropius-Bau Berlin