by Heinrich Tessenow
Less well known than Peter Behrens, Bruno Taut, or Walter Gropius, architect, urban planner, and professor Heinrich Tessenow (1876–1950) was a leading figure in early 20th-century german architecture. He had several gifted young students destined to make their mark in the years of Adolf Hitler's rise to power, including Albert Speer, who would become the Führer's architect. In 1934, Tessenow was removed from his teaching position at the university and devoted himself mainly to theoretical work. After 1945, he was reinstated by the soviet administration of East Germany; however, his declining health prevented him from fully dedicating himself to his duties. His professional activity in the first thirty years of the 20th century included numerous projects for public buildings, residential complexes, and community facilities. Tessenow was an excellent urban planner who conceived his designs in sober and economical terms while drawing on precise cultural and environmental roots. The most important essay in which he condensed his architectural ideas is Hausbau und dergleichen (Housebuilding and Such Things), published in 1916. We draw the last of the eight chapters, entitled "Ornament", from this book. Tessenow's arguments closely resemble Adolf Loos's arguments in Ornament and Crime. Clichés relating to the psychology of children and women, the fascination with the primitive and the wild, and the contrast between progressives and lovers of the good old days characterize the entire proto-rationalist climate. However, in Tessenow's interpretation, a fundamental observation is continually emphasized: ornamentation is an irrepressible need within and outside the realm of the arts. See H. Tessenow, Hausbau und dergleichen, Bruno Cassirer, Berlin 1916, pp. 56-61. Translation is ours.
The ornament, or decoration, is everywhere. It is best when it is less deliberate and most satisfying when we treat it with indifference. Ornament plays the same role in our work as idioms do in spoken language. They are inevitable and reproduce the ways of our social life naturally. However, we must not rely too heavily on their easy appeal, or they will become a hindrance.
We can only create ornament if we consider the necessary and progressive elements of collective life or the fundamentals of good craftsmanship. For example, when we build a brick wall according to the rules – that is, when we respect the order and keep in mind what is essential and necessary above all – then the wall will openly display its decorative properties. However, we will have achieved this result without intending to do so directly. In the best cases, we could say that ornament is a kind of involuntary smile, capable of brightening all the effort and seriousness of hard work.
(Figure 32 highlights certain parts, which is unnecessary, to better illustrate the decorative effect of a brick wall framework).
Ornament is the result of the fatigue and resignation that inevitably arise in our lives and work. This is why we fight ornament with the same commitment with which we try to overcome tiredness, mediocrity, complacency, and resignation.
The best thing about ornament is that it can be abstract, silly, or inexplicable 〈1〉. Ornament, between you and me, has something of feminine frivolity about it. It can express a whole world, but always timidly or vaguely, through figurative language. Ornament lacks determination, which distances it from what we commonly call demanding work. Important work requires intense concentration, but ornament is the enemy of concentration. It wants to play while we work. In this sense, we would have to be gods to achieve anything important through ornament.
Once again, I would like to reiterate what I have already said about technical form in relation to ornament. Technical form, too, needs to be translated in order to have meaning for us. This translation takes place mainly through our knowledge, whereas for ornament, it takes place primarily through our vision. We value both modes of transmission equally, just as we attribute greater or lesser significance to technical form and ornament. However, if we remove form from ornament, we are left with nothing. If we remove form from technical form, though, we are still left with the technical element.
Once upon a time, there was a man who worked hard all day to make a living. In the evening, after eating and drinking well, he sat happily chatting with his wife. When his wife got up to put the children to bed, the man began carving an arrow for his bow with a mixture of diligence and laziness. This is probably how ornament began; it was almost a game, but it was also work. Had he not been tired that evening, instead of decorating his arrow, he might have tried to improve its quality, i.e., its dynamic shape.
Ornamentation proves that we have always lacked the intellectual vitality and discernment necessary to understand and enhance the essential aspects of our work. In a sense, it’s akin to doing an odd job before going to sleep.
We often consider ornament to be the beginning of a completed work, which is why we teach drawing with great care. However, ornament is not a beginning. For example, it’s hard to imagine the aforementioned man, feeling fresh and rested the next morning, calmly continuing to cover his arrow with ornament. However, it is beyond doubt that the gentleman was busy with other things the next morning.
Ornament is undoubtedly the product of our secondary abilities. In everyday life, there is always something completely marginal that must come last. This is why, despite our best efforts, we cannot create ornaments that surpass those produced by primitive or savage peoples.
The thought or feeling that drives us toward ornament is tired, i.e., without commitment. This is why ornament is not suitable for children – it is not childlike at all. Children always take their work seriously, often too seriously. When they are tired, they stop working altogether and go to sleep. Children seek what excites the senses, so from this point of view, they might even love ornamentation. However, children also desire things that correspond to reality. They draw houses with red roofs, trees with green leaves, and ladies with five fingers on each hand. Instinctively, children will never resort to ornament, nor will they love it for its own sake while they are still uncorrupted. On the contrary, old fogeys – men who are out of step with their times – civilizations that have come to a standstill, and all those who cannot move forward, don’t believe in progress, yet survive and work anyway, love ornament. Today, however, we find ourselves in a state that is more infantile than we might think. We are at an early stage in which we firmly believe in our ability to progress. Consequently, we shy away from ornament for its own sake.
The more ornament hinders us, the deeper our pain, the greater our joy, and the stronger our desire for progress. A profound commitment excludes secondary issues.
While creative commitment confronts the world with all its contradictions and imbalances and seeks to give everything a form that is not only acceptable, but also a source of joy, ornament attempts to hide this same reality and cover it with a smile. For example, when we see the rich decoration of a door, we forget about the door itself. On the other hand, if the door is constructed according to a precise design, its beautiful measurements and proportions reflect the requirements and joy of construction itself. In this case, using the door becomes a pleasure, and we rejoice in the fact that we cannot do without doors. In the end, the decorative element will be there, but it will not have been intentional or a cause for concern.
Ornament is always more aesthetic than artistic. Unlike forms with content, ornaments are exhausted by their form alone. While art arouses different sensations, ornament remains indifferent to the type and quality of these sensations. While art provokes a certain feeling, ornament makes no distinctions. The sensations it produces are always random and indefinable. As I have said before, the specific qualities of ornament are confused with the qualities of female frivolity. This is evident in restrained laughter (a lady is not allowed to laugh loudly), irony (she is always above it all but must not show her superiority), and her fantasy world (she dreams and fears reality). These characteristics of female frivolity, as opposed to the positive qualities of women, are very rare today. We do not hold it in high regard because it no longer meets our needs, so it does not persuade us. The same applies to ornament. We have plenty of it, but we don’t feel the need for it. We only do it because it was done in the past. It is not spontaneous. It wants to be taken seriously. All of this harms it. We don’t need it, and it’s not justified.
A love of craftsmanship includes a love of ornament; it cannot reject it. In all our work, ornament is like our whistling and humming. It is an ornament that we do not seek, yet it gives our modest work such a distinctive character. It is like the poppy in a wheat field – a secondary smile in the vast field of utility. It is a smile that we do not seek but cannot avoid, and therefore it must be silent and as “secondary” and shy as possible.
〈1〉 This occurs when each work is so advanced that it no longer allows for the use of decorative elements inspired by nature, or when these elements have been modified to such an extent that they no longer bear any relation to their inspiration [Author's note]. Homepage: from left to right, Harald Dohrn, Wolf Dohrn, Alexander von Salzmann, and Heinrich Tessenow sitting on the steps of the Festspielhaus Hellerau in Dresden, designed by Tessenow himself, anonymous photo, circa 1913 (Bibliothèque de Genève). Below: Reproduction of pages 56–61 of Heinrich Tessenow's book "Hausbau und dergleichen", Bruno Cassirer, Berlin 1916 (www.archive.org).
