Theodor Fischer (28 May 1862 – 25 December 1938) was a German
architect
An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...
and teacher.
Career
Fischer planned public housing projects for the city of Munich beginning in 1893. He was the joint founder and first chairman of the
Deutscher Werkbund
The Deutscher Werkbund (English: "German Association of Craftsmen"; ) is a German association of artists, architects, designers and industrialists established in 1907. The Werkbund became an important element in the development of modern arch ...
(German work federation, 1907), as well as member of the German version of the
Garden city movement
The garden city movement was a 20th century urban planning movement promoting satellite communities surrounding the central city and separated with greenbelts. These Garden Cities would contain proportionate areas of residences, industry, and ...
. In 1909 Fischer accepted a position as professor for architecture at the
Technical University of Munich
The Technical University of Munich (TUM or TU Munich; german: Technische Universität München) is a public research university in Munich, Germany. It specializes in engineering, technology, medicine, and applied and natural sciences.
Establis ...
.
Notable pupils
Famous pupils of Fischer include
Paul Bonatz,
Hugo Häring
Hugo Häring (11 May 1882 – 17 May 1958) was a German architect and architectural writer best known for his writings on "organic architecture", and as a figure in architectural debates about functionalism in the 1920s and 1930s, though he had a ...
,
Ernst May
Ernst May (27 July 1886 – 11 September 1970) was a List of German architects, German architect and :German urban planners, city planner.
May successfully applied urban design techniques to the city of Frankfurt am Main during the Weimar R ...
,
Erich Mendelsohn
Erich Mendelsohn (21 March 1887 – 15 September 1953) was a German architect, known for his expressionist architecture in the 1920s, as well as for developing a dynamic Functionalism (architecture), functionalism in his projects for department ...
,
JJP Oud
Jacobus Johannes Pieter Oud, commonly called J. J. P. Oud (9 February 1890 – 5 April 1963) was a Dutch architect. His fame began as a follower of the '' De Stijl'' movement.
Oud was born in Purmerend, the son of a tobacco and wine merchant. ...
,
Bruno Taut
Bruno Julius Florian Taut (4 May 1880 – 24 December 1938) was a renowned German architect, urban planner and author of Prussian Lithuanian heritage ("taut" means "nation" in Lithuanian). He was active during the Weimar period and is know ...
,
German Bestelmeyer
German Bestelmeyer (8 June 1874 – 30 June 1942) was a German architect, university lecturer, and proponent of Nazi architecture. Most of his work was in South Germany.
Life and career
Bestelmeyer was born in Nuremberg, the son of a militar ...
and
Paul Schmitthenner
Paul Schmitthenner (born Lauterburg, Elsass-Lothringen, Germany 15 December 1884 – 11 November 1972) was a German architect, city planner and Professor at the University of Stuttgart.
During Nazi Germany, Schmitthenner was one of Adolf Hi ...
.
Style
Originally an imitator of historical styles, he changed direction, seeking a style which was closer to German tradition; his rediscovery of the expressive qualities of stone influenced many of his pupils, and his search for a more genuinely
volkisch style explains his nationalist utterances in the early part of the
Third Reich
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
. Fischer described his own style as something between
historicism
Historicism is an approach to explaining the existence of phenomena, especially social and cultural practices (including ideas and beliefs), by studying their history, that is, by studying the process by which they came about. The term is widely u ...
and
art nouveau
Art Nouveau (; ) is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. The style is known by different names in different languages: in German, in Italian, in Catalan, and also known as the Modern ...
. He tried to always work in the local context, and the socio-cultural character of the region, with an eye toward the social effect of his plans.
Bibliography
* (1988): ''Theodor Fischer: Architekt Und Staedtebauer'', Wilhelm Ernst & Sohn Verlag fur Architektur und technische Wissenschaften (German edition)
*Falko Lehmann (1988): ''Friedrich Theodor Fischer, 1803-1867: Architekt im Grossherzogtum Baden (Studien zur Bauforschung)'', Geiger-Verlag (German edition)
External links
19th-century German architects
1862 births
1938 deaths
People from Schweinfurt
Technical University of Munich alumni
Technical University of Munich faculty
Art Nouveau architects
20th-century German architects
Bavarian architects
{{Germany-architect-stub