More than Bauhaus

Photography of the Weimar Republic in Germany 1918-1933 and photography of the Polish interwar period 1918-1939

International Cultural Center Krakow
May 8 to August 1, 2021

Photography has been the central medium of our visually driven society since at least the 1920s and continues to this day. It depicts all aspects of our lives—from the private to the public, and from the political to the cultural—and conveys our image of the world. With revolutionary inventions in camera technology and the printing capabilities of newspapers and magazines, the 1920s were the first era in which all these areas were photographed and—crucially—published. Historically speaking, photography from the 1920s and 1930s is an essential source of historical information and for understanding both the past and the present.

Based on Aby Warburg's theory of the pictorial atlas, we present motifs typical of both countries in eight chapters and an epilogue. Each chapter represents an area of political, social, or cultural life; together, they create a picture of this fascinating era in all its ruptures and contradictions. We see a pivotal moment in 20th-century history, oscillating between the Roaring Twenties with their new freedoms, dance, and technological revolutions on the one hand, and hyperinflation and mass unemployment on the other. Attacks from left-wing and, above all, right-wing political movements repeatedly destabilized the system and ultimately led to the catastrophe of National Socialism and the Second World War.

The comparison clearly reveals parallels and differences between developments in Poland and Germany. Above all, however, this historical review reveals a world that bears surprising similarities to our current situation. Even the fundamental shift in the media dissemination of photography back then is reflected in today's transition from printed to digital images, with all its consequences.

The exhibition features many of the great photographers of the era who, as avant-garde figures, redefined various fields of photography, from reportage and applied photography in fashion and portraiture to artistic strategies. Their achievements continue to shape visual aesthetics today. New Objectivity and New Vision, Bauhaus and Surrealism gave rise to a completely new and, above all, independent visual language for the medium of photography, which still appears modern today.

Themes and aesthetic expressions of the past can be associatively applied to our current life situation. The question of how media shape our worldview and thereby (co-)determine how we think and feel, and ultimately how we act, is more relevant than ever in the digital age. In our globalized, multifaceted world with its flood of data and its diversity of information sources, the question today is: How can we best inform ourselves? But also: What manipulates us in particular ways? What role does photography play in social media, from Twitter to Instagram? The influential Bauhaus teacher László Moholy-Nagy prophesied as early as 1927 that "the one who is ignorant of photography is the illiterate of the future," and for the Smithsonian Institution, the answer remains clear in the 21st century: "Photography Changes Everything" is the title of a volume published in 2012.

The presentation in Krakow is a reduced version of the exhibition "Photography in the Weimar Republic ," which was on display at the LVR LandesMuseum in Bonn from September 2019 to March 2020. In the "From the Archives" series, it is the fourth exhibition based on the extensive photographic collections of the three partner institutions, supplemented here by loans from SZ Photo and the ullstein bild collection.

An exhibition by the ICC Krakow in collaboration with the LVR LandesMuseum Bonn, the Deutsche Fotothek Dresden and the F.C. Gundlach Foundation Hamburg.

We thank everyone involved, and especially our Polish partners, for their excellent cooperation and the successful realization of the exhibition under these challenging circumstances. Even under the current difficult conditions, we have managed to bring this wonderful selection of images from this period, taken in our neighboring countries of Poland and Germany, to the public!

International Cultural Center Krakow
Rynek Główny 25
31-008 Kraków

Opening hours:
Tuesday to Sunday, 11:00 AM – 7:00 PM
Last entry at 6:30 pm

CORONA!
PLEASE NOTE THE CURRENT OPENING HOURS AND VISITING RULES!