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Best Bauhaus tradition

 

In Tel Aviv young artisans and students from Germany and Israel are building an unusual pavilion.

 

Anyone entering the campus of Tel Aviv University through the main gates won’t be able to miss it: the German-Israeli Pavilion currently being built. Once finished, the single-storey building with two walls that taper upward will give rise to numerous associations with the Bauhaus architectural tradition, in terms of form, functionality and not least the way it was created. A team consisting of Israeli and German students of architecture and engineering as well as apprentices and young craftspeople has until 11 October to complete the structure. Then the Germans will return to Berlin. The ambitious project is being financed by the German Federal Environmental Foundation (DBU) and Federal Foreign Office.

A group of Israeli students sits in front of computer models and sketches until well into evening pondering over the final plans, which should have been finished some time ago. Architecture lecturer Dan Shapira urges the students to hurry, advising them to distribute tasks when decisions can’t be made in the large group. “The more opinions and ideas come together, the more difficult it is to agree on one design”, says Or Naggar, a student at Tel Aviv University. The basic concept underlying the coproduction by aspiring academics and tradesmen poses a great challenge for the project participants, for they are all supposed to be involved in almost all stages of the process. The tradesmen are called on to bring their own ideas to bear in the planning process and the aspiring architects and engineers are pitching in with the build.

 

“A practical approach is being taken to the integrated planning”, explains Peter Winter, who with his partner Robert K. Huber from project office “zukunftsgeraeusche” in Berlin developed the idea and is coordinating the project. Four educational institutions are working together on its realization, namely Technische Universität Berlin, Tel Aviv University, Knobelsdorff-Schule Berlin Sixth Form College and the Tel Hai Rodman Practical College of Technology. Further partners in Germany and Israel are supporting the project. “We are working across disciplines and hierarchies”, says Winter. “Architects, engineers and tradesmen are collaborating on an equal footing.” That sounds familiar. German architect Walter Gropius once said something similar. Gropius, who founded the Bauhaus in 1919 (initially an art school, it soon became a fixture in the avant-garde of Classical Modernism), made the following appeal in the Bauhaus Manifesto: “Architects, sculptors, painters, we all must return to the crafts!”

 

Back in the spring the project participants, a good 30 young people, met up in Berlin for a first project week and drew up the plans for the building. That was a challenge, particularly for “those who are unfamiliar with the theory, because they come from the practical field”, reports Shapira. In a plenary session one of the designs conceived in the group work was chosen and subsequently further developed in the individual specialist areas. The engineers were asked to provide solutions for air-conditioning technology, structural design and load-bearing capacity, the architects design proposals. In order to bring the various ideas together, the participants regularly communicated via email and Skype.

It is not just the young Germans who are familiar with the ideas of the Bauhaus; the Israelis are well acquainted with the style. In 2003 the “White City of Tel Aviv” with its Bauhaus buildings was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Its buildings were designed by young Jewish architects who fled Germany to Palestine after the Nazis rose to power and their pupils. “Bauhaus signifies a beautiful shared heritage for Germans and Israelis”, notes Huber, summing up. What is personally important to him in this project is taking a “sustainable approach to the material and architecture”. Dan Shapira talks of a “holistic approach” underlying the students’ model, and that they “draw a line in the Bauhaus style from the floor up the walls to the roof”. In the end the pavilion is given an oriental touch by what is known as a mashrabiya, a decorative wooden lattice traditionally used in Muslim countries to provide shade and privacy as well as enable air circulation.

 

The encounter between different cultures and mentalities is enriching for both sides. “We move towards one another and meet in the middle”, says Shapira, who praises German thoroughness, work ethic and commitment when there is a schedule to keep to. The Israelis are “more relaxed overall” and, when something goes wrong, like to pipe up with the motto: “It’ll be alright.”

 

At the end of the day the young people from both countries like to leave together. The craftspeople, who turn up at the building site at 7 a.m., have long since left for the beach when the up-and-coming architects and engineers are still honing plans in the evening. Or Naggar is pleased about the project on his campus. “It is a great opportunity for us”, he says. More students would have liked to participate in Israel; ultimately names were drawn from a hat. The Pavilion is just the first of a whole series of German-Israeli architecture projects on the drawing board.

Susanne Knaul

Partner

Dear ladies and gentlemen,

This is the archived content of official bilateral website that was founded by the German and Israeli government on the occasion of the Jubilee Year 2015. This website contains the articles of the bilateral website, but will be static and will not be maintained. It serves as documentation of the multi-faceted cooperation between Germany and Israel We hope you enjoy exploring 50 years of German-Israeli relations!

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