Japanese students in the Bauhaus

     Chapter 16 has a lot of interesting information and I got really interested in the Bauhaus. Needless to say, the Bauhaus has a lot of influence on artworks, architecture, and particularly artists, which made a new step to the Modernism. I wonder if there is still the Bauhaus exists, what influence can be applied to the modern arts. It is such an unfortunate that it had closed due to the conflict between Nazi. 

     There were two Japanese students who went to the Bauhaus to study architecture and designs, Takehiko Mizutani (http://www.bauhausreedition.com/contemporary-bauhaus-design-furniture-complements/mizutani-takehiko/), the first Japanese student there, and Iwao Yamawaki (http://www.artnet.com/artists/iwao-yamawaki/) and his wife Michiko. Mizutani attended lectures of urban city planning, condominium and apartment design, and furniture design by Joseph Albers, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Marcel Breuer, and many other famous professors and artists. After he came back to Japan, he introduced what he had learned and seen about the Bauhaus and applied their educational strategy, policy and courses to Japanese fine arts education. Likewise, Iwao and Michiko Yamawaki also learned about architecture and photomontage in the Bauhaus and they applied the latest technology to Japanese architectural design. Among all those Japanese students, Iwao Yamawaki was the only person who actually constructed architectural building using the Modernism philosophy and technology cultivated in the Bauhaus. Mr. and Mrs. Yamawaki also created one artwork named "The end of the Dessau Bauhaus." This artwork includes the photomontage of Nazis army and the Bauhaus. 

     Before the beginning of the World War , there were less influence from abroad in Japan. But thanks to those people who went to study abroad and brought back the latest technology in Europe to Japan, now we can see many of Modern artworks. It can be also said to Laszlo Moholy-Nagy who went to America and opened the art design school in Chicago. We can greatly appreciate those artists' effort today.