Three Blocks of Flats, Erwin Gutkind, Berlin

May - September 2014

I spotted the first one in the evening sun, stared for a while and then had to cross the street to look closer. All of them are large blocks, but with no sense of monotony, no matter their length. A play of recesses and projections – as in Ollenhauer Straße, or just a perfect layering of concrete, plastered wall and bricks – as at the Sonnenhof. There are at least two types of bricks and something English about their minute use. It was to England where Erwin Gutkind fled in 1933. As so many others from the turbulent but grand Weimar times, another lost talent for Germany.

Wohnblock, Ollenhauerstr., Erwin Gutkind, 1927-28:

„Sonnenhof“, Marie Curie Allee, Erwin Gutkind, 1926/27:

Wohnanalage Thulestrasse; Erwin Gutkind, 1925-27: