This dramatically patterned woven textile, with its bold geometric shapes, reflects the design revolution that swept Europe and the United States in the early 1900s. Its vivid colors and striking forms recall the work of artists such as Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee and László Moholy-Nagy, who were at the forefront of modernist painting and design in the early 20th century.
This textile’s design might have originated from the Bauhaus, a groundbreaking school of art and design founded in 1919 in Weimar, Germany. The Bauhaus brought together architects, painters, weavers and designers who sought to create a new aesthetic for the modern age and revive German craftsmanship and industry after World War I. Under the leadership of architect Walter Gropius, the school later moved to Dessau in 1925 and then Berlin before it was closed by the National Socialist Party in 1939.
Among the school’s various departments was the Weaving Workshop. It was run by male instructors — including Kandinsky at one point — but staffed entirely by women. The workshop’s goal was to develop innovative designs for wall hangings, rugs and upholstery that could be adapted for industrial production, helping to revitalize Germany’s textile industry.
Although the fragment in the Cotsen Textile Traces Study Collection is attributed to Walter Gropius, there is an ongoing question as to whether the design may have been created by one of the women in the Weaving Workshop.
Note: The copyright status of T-1505b is still under review and information about this textile may be updated with new research. Please email our collections management team at collections@gwu.edu with any information.
Researched by Julie Geschwind
Julie Geschwind has been a docent with the museum since 2004. She has been an assistant curator for textiles at the Baltimore Museum of Art and is adjunct faculty at the Maryland Institute College of Art and the George Washington University teaching courses on the history of textiles.