On 4 Mar. 2017, at 1:11 am, Laura R <lauraroz...@gmail.com> wrote: > >> I came across something quite wonderful in my PhD research today. >> >> I picked up a book on Frank Lloyd Wright, an American architect with a >> considerable global reputation, at the University library, therein I >> discovered that he was inspired for a series of window-frame designs, and I >> suspect for the use of proportion in his career, by the seventh gift of >> Froebel as his insight into proportion. > > You should get the book Inventing Kindergarten by Norman Brosterman. There is > a whole chapter about the influence of kindergarten ideas (and behind that, > Froebel’s) on Frank Lloyd Wright, as well as other modern artists. Quoting > from its cover: “Using examples from the work of important artists who > attended kindergarten —including Georges Braque, Piet Mondrian, Paul Klee, > Wassily Kandinsky, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Le Corbusier, among others —he > demonstrates that the design ideas of kindergarten prefigured modern > conceptions for the aesthetic power of geometric abstraction.” Norman > Brosterman’s amazing collection of Froebelian crafts was part of a MoMa > exhibition, Century of the Child, in 2011: > http://www.brosterman.com/kindergarten.shtml. > But get the book, you’ll love it. > > Laura Rozenberg
Thanks so much Laura and Patsy for chiming in here, I’m going to get that book! I happened to also borrow a book on the Bauhaus teaching methodology - following a research trail left by Erik Demaine on Curved Folding, and from the list of artist you mention Klee and, Kandinsky were teachers at the Bauhaus. Made me wonder if they are connected - being German - the time periods bookending… after a little more research, and I find the connection is already documented. "The Bauhaus ... including the way in which it was set up by Walter Gropius and Johannes Itten, its roots in the work of Friedrich Froebel” - Lerner, Fern. "Foundations for design education: continuing the Bauhaus Vorkurs vision." Studies in Art Education 46.3 (2005): 211-226. Without reading Inventing Kindergarten, I can see the same visual and sculptural language in Froebel and Bauhaus. The visual and sculptural language - including origami - was being influenced by more than a casual connection of Froebelian methods, Froebel was in the roots of the course design. The transfer from Froebel origami to Bauhaus paper folding is a very interesting connection. This is a plausible reason as to why Albers was teaching paper folding in the preliminary course in the first place. Paper as a medium has an intrinsic property: it can be folded. Folding is geometry; is mathematics; is a structural language. This point in particular would be of interest to origami to know more about. Matthew Gardiner
