Bruno Taut – Die Auflösung der Städte

Taut, Bruno.

Die Auflösung der Städte oder Die Erde eine gute Wohnung oder auch: Der Weg zur Alpinen Architektur in 30 Zeichnungen.

Hagen, Folkwang Verlag 1920.

Lithographed half-title, title in red, blue and black, and 30 plates (4 colour) printed on paper stocks of varying colours, 81 pp. text.

27 x 21,5 cm. Original publisher’s lithographed boards.

sold

First edition. Since the summer of 1918, Bruno Taut had been collecting political and above all socialist texts.  He prepared excerpts from essays on urban and land questions, a total of 82 pages, in such a way that, together with 30 drawings of his own, they described the surface of the earth as a „good dwelling“ for all people.

The prerequisite for this, in his view, was the elimination of all cities and states. Taut’s aim was to show the consequences of an equal distribution of people under the conditions of a happy need arising from the inner necessity of each individual. The book was intended to enable its readers to reflect „on what needs to be considered in the present day when building new settlements. Its unlimited wealth of forms could almost be called vegetal and biological.“

„Die Auflösung der Städte“, published in August 1920, is Bruno Taut’s fourth book of utopian architectural visions after „Die Stadtkrone“ (1917/1919), „Alpine Architektur“ (1918/February 1920), and „Der Weltbaumeister“ (June 1920).

Very fine clean copy. The spine of the binding is almost invisibly professionally restored, without any text or paper loss.