László Maholy-Nagy
Born. 20.07.1895 Bácsborsód, Hungary
Died. 24.11.1946 in Chicago
Hungarian-American painter, photographer, stage designer, (Bauhaus)
About the artist
László Moholy-Nagy: was born in László Weisz Hungary on 20 July 1895. He was a painter and photographer as well as a professor at the Bauhaus school.
Nagy believed strongly in the integration of technology and industry into the arts and constructivism was an influencing factor.
He was said to be “relentlessly experimental” because of his original style in painting, drawing, photography, collage, sculpture, film, theater, and writing.
His largest accomplishment may be the School of Design in Chicago, which survives today as part of the Illinois Institute of Technology, which art historian Elizabeth Siegel called “his overarching work of art”.
He joined the Austro-Hungarian army as an artillery officer In 1915 during World War I, documenting his time there by making sketches, paintings, and writing about his wartime experiences in 1917, he was injured on the Russian front and sent to Budapest to recover.
After his discharge from the military in October 1918, he attended Róbert Berény‘s private art school and formally converted to the Hungarian Reformed Church.
From 1923 to 1928 , Moholy-Nagy taught at the Bauhaus in Weimar. During his time there, the school moved away from its expressionistic leanings, favouring its original aims as a school of design and industrial integration. Moholy-Nagy left the Bauhaus in 1928, establishing his studio in Berlin
An iconic achievement was Moholy-Nagy’s construction of the Lichtrequisit specially built for a stage, with moving parts designed to have light projected through them to create shifting light reflections and shadows on nearby surfaces. It was later named a light-space modulator and with made with the help of Istvan Seboek, a Hungarian architect. It was shown at the Deutscher Werkbund exhibition which was held in Paris during the summer of 1930.
In 1933, with the Nazis in power in Germany, he was no longer allowed to work as he was a foreign citizen. He moved to the Netherlands in 1934 helping with commercials before deciding to move with his family to London in 1935.
Whilst in London, he worked on several commercial design jobs, including work for Imperial Airways and it is believed that he also worked at a shop making displays for men’s underwear.
At the invitation of Walter Paepcke, the Chairman of the Container Corporation of America, Moholy-Nagy was asked to move to Chicago In 1937, to become the director of the New Bauhaus. The philosophy of the school was ideally similar to that of the original and the invitation was accepted.
However, the school lost financial support after only a single academic year and closed in 1938. Moholy-Nagy restarted his commercial design work, continuing to do so for the rest of his life.
In 1939 Moholy-Nagy opened the School of Design in Chicago which survives today as part of the Illinois Institute of Technology, This is where he made static and mobile sculptures in transparent plastic, often using chromed metal for the finishing details
Although Moholy-Nagy was diagnosed with leukaemia in 1945, he continued to produce artwork in multiple media, taught his students, and attended conferences for as long as he was able. He died in Chicago on November 24, 1946
