Erich Mendelsohn

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Mendelsohn was born March 21, 1887 in Olsztyn, Poland, and died on September 19, 1953. He got his start making sketches, and put himself through the Technical Academy in Munich. Although he was drafted into the army, at the start of World War 1, he did not stop drawing and sketching; by the end of the war his sketches had gained notoriety and he was hired to build and design the Hermann Hat factory in Luckenwalde, Germany. This was the beginning of Mendelsohn’s career. Mendelsohn was an expressionist, who liked to make sturdy rectangular structures that had a round centerpiece or corner. His buildings were mostly made out of concrete, steel and glass like those of most expressionists. Mendelsohn often let the form of his buildings be influenced by their function; they were never designed without their purpose being foremost in his mind. In fact, Mendelsohn was a firm believer that form follows function and not the way around, which is evident in his design for the Einstein tower. The Einsteintrum The Einsteintrum or Einstein tower is designed to house a solar observatory, to either prove or disprove Einstein’s theory of relativity and is built in 11/11/13 Potsdam, Germany. It is the first tower observatory in Europe. Mendelsohn worked with an astronomer called Erwin Finlay Freundlich, who designed it. This is Erich Mendelsohn’s most famous work and was finished in 1921. When it was finished Mendelsohn personally gave Einstein a tour of the tower, eagerly waiting for some word of Einstein’s approval, yet Einstein said nothing to Mendelsohn and later simply described it as “organic’ to the building committee. Erich search for approval steamed from the fact that he had designed the building while being inspired by “the mystique aroun...

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...d usher in the modernist movement that would define the 20th century, and died on September 19th 1953, in beautiful San Francisco.

Works Cited

"History." dlwp.com. De La Warr Pavilion ,
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"Sonnenobservatorium Einsteinturm." aip.de. Leibniz-institut für astrophysik Potsdam, n.d. Web. 11 Nov 2013.
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set_language=en>. Phillip, Ferrato. "It's Presidio Heights' The Russell House." Curved. Curved San Francisco, 06/21/2010. Web. 11 Nov 2013. . 11/11/13 "Erich Mendelsohn." Encyclopedia Britannica . Encyclopedia Britannica , n.d. Web.
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