Passion, Function and Beauty. â Henry van de Velde and his ...

Audio Guide to the exhibition 

Passion, Function and Beauty. 

– 

Henry van de Velde and his 

Contribution to European 

Modernism 

Editing: Linon Medien 

Klassik Stiftung Weimar | Exhibition Passion, Function and Beauty | 03.2013 

1

Content 

701: Henry van de Velde: Six-arm Candelabra ......................................................................... 3 

702: Henry van de Velde: Faits du village VII, La fille qui remaille (Girl sewing) (1890)....... 4 

703: Victor Horta: Elements from the Turin Ensemble (1902).................................................. 5 

704: Henry van de Velde: Belt Buckle for Gertrud Osthaus (1898/99) ..................................... 6 

705: Henry van de Velde: Abstract Plant Composition (1893).................................................. 7 

706: Henry van de Velde: Blue Tea Gown with wide, decorative border (um 1896) ............... 8 

707: Henry van de Velde: Bloemenwerf Dining Table (1895) .................................................. 10 

708: Henry van de Velde: Barber’s workstation for the François Haby Barber Salon ............. 11 

709: Henry van de Velde: Tropon Advertising Poster (1897/98) ............................................. 12 

710: Gustave Serrurier-Bovy: Silex Armchair (1905) ............................................................... 13 

Josef Hoffmann: Sitzmaschine (1908) 

711: Henry van de Velde: Writing Desk for the Publisher Ludwig Löffler (1898) ................... 14 

712: Erica von Scheel: Student’s Work: Vinegar and Oil Bottles (1903).................................. 15 

713: Henry van de Velde: Dinner Service for 10 people (1903/04)........................................... 16 

714: Johanna Brinkhaus: Wax Batik on Silk.............................................................................. 17 

715: Henry van de Velde: Wax Batik on Silk (1905) ................................................................ 18 

716: Georg Kolbe: Portrait of Harry Graf Kessler (1916) ......................................................... 19 

717: Henry van de Velde: Wicker Chair (1908) ....................................................................... 20 

718: Henry van de Velde: Nursery Table (1911)....................................................................... 21 

719: Henry van de Velde: Draft Design for the Director’s Room (1908).................................. 22 

720: Henry van de Velde: Home Hohe Pappeln (Model).......................................................... 23 

721: Henry van de Velde: Dumont Theatre Draft Design (1904), Werkbund Theatre ............. 24 

722: Henry van de Velde: Draft Drawing of the Nietzsche Monument (1912) ........................ 25 

723: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner: “Head of van de Velde (light)” (1917)........................................ 26 

724: Henry van de Velde: Kettle with réchaud (1922-1925) ..................................................... 27 

725: Model of the ‘Prince Baudouin’ mail steamer (1934)........................................................ 28 

726: Max Elskamp: Salutations, dont d’angé (1893)................................................................. 29 

727: Friedrich Nietzsche: Also sprach Zarathustra (Thus Spoke Zarathustra) (1908)............... 30 

728: Desk with book cases, UB Ghent (from 1920) .................................................................. 31 

729: Oscar Jespers: Portrait of Henry van de Velde (c. 1930) ................................................... 32 


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701: Henry van de Velde: Six-arm Candelabra 

Henry van de Velde: Six-arm Candelabra (1898/99) 

This major exhibition of outstanding works 

by Henry van de Velde presents the spectrum 

of his artistic activity – from 1890 to 

the end of the 1930s. 

Van de Velde’s most productive period 

was probably between 1902 and 1917 

when he was here in Weimar as the advisor 

for Thuringian artisans and craft industries, 

and was Director of the School of Arts and 

Crafts. 

Our exhibition shows that Van de Velde 

was a multi-talented artist whose designs 

embraced all areas of life, from houses to 

furniture, clothing, jewellery and lamps – 

and even the interior furnishings for a series 

of large steamers. Henry van de Velde 

had a vision of transforming people’s surroundings 

into a Gesamtkunstwerk - a synthesis 

of the arts – where every artistic de- 

Welcome to this major exhibition entitled: 

‘Passion, Function and Beauty. Henry van 

de Velde and his Contribution to European 

Modernism’! 

This six-arm candelabra, our first exhibit 

on this tour, dates from the late 1890s. It 

already combines many elements characteristic 

of Van de Velde’s work, especially 

his love for dynamic lines and curves. The 

candelabra’s design is nearly entirely 

structured around dynamic lines. In some 

elements, these lines flow smoothly, while 

in others they create striking curves away 

from and towards the centre. Yet, in this 

process, the individual form is perfectly 

fused with the object’s function. In Van de 

Velde’s view, the perfection of an object’s 

design is directly linked to how well the 

object fulfils its purpose. 

(short pause) 


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702: Henry van de Velde: Faits du village VII, La fille qui remaille 

(Girl sewing) (1890) 

Henry van de Velde: Faits du village VII, La fille 

qui remaille (Girl sewing) (1890) 

The young girl is portrayed calmly concentrating 

on her work. It is a sunny day; 

the light through the trees casts an oddlyshaped 

shadow on the grass. Behind the 

girl, we can see a path and a large building. 

This work belongs to van de Velde’s 

Faits du village series comprising various 

scenes from village life, and dates 

from 1890. To create this image, he employed 

the pointillist technique of painstakingly 

juxtaposing dabs of pure colour 

onto the picture’s support. Pointillism is 

most closely associated with the French 

painter George Seurat. Van de Velde had 

discovered the technique several years 

before in Seurat’s works, and was 

thrilled by its possibilities. 

Pointillism does not mix colours on a 

palette and then apply them, but sets dots 

or short brushstrokes of pure colour close 

to one another. The colours are then only 

combined to create an image in the eye 

of the beholder. 

When he was 17, Henry van de Velde 

started his classical art training at the 

Fine Arts Academy in Antwerp – despite 

the disapproval of his parents, who wanted 

him to go into a solid middle-class administrative 

career. 

As you can see, Henry van der Velde was a 

virtuoso painter. He spent time in Paris a 

number of times to explore the works of 

the Impressionist painters, and painted in a 

pointillist style for some years until, in 

1890, he saw works by Vincent van Gogh. 

Deeply impressed, he then sought to portray 

the flow of life through an emotive and 

dynamic use of line. 


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703: Victor Horta: Elements from the Turin Ensemble (1902) 

The houses that Horta designed became 

milestones in art nouveau in Belgium. 

In van de Velde’s view, Horta was only a 

‘mediocre architect’. Above all, he disliked 

the overloaded, functionless ornamental 

elements which Horta used to decorate his 

buildings. A good example here is the Socialist 

Party headquarters in Brussels with 

a façade entirely in glass and steel – as you 

can see in the photo on the wall. In his 

memoirs, van de Velde noted: 

Victor Horta: Elements from the Turin Ensemble 

(1902) 

In 1902, one of the seminal events in popularising 

art nouveau took place – the International 

Exhibition of Modern Decorative 

Arts in Turin, an exhibition exclusively 

dedicated to design. 

The objects on show there included this 

couch table and chair created by the Belgian 

architect and designer Victor Horta. 

Born in 1861, Horta was one of the first 

architects on the European mainland to 

reject the historical-revivalist styles so 

prevalent in the second half of the nineteenth 

century. 

Even in the early 1890s, Horta began transferring 

art nouveau designs to architecture. 

Previously, the new direction taken by art 

nouveau – or Jugendstil, as it is known in 

Germany – was primarily applied to craft 

products. 

Victor Horta: Elements from the Turin Ensemble 

(1902) 

“Horta’s exaggerations are intended to 

beautify the rational metal constructions, 

but are annoying for their pointlessness and 

unbridled fantasy.” 


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704: Henry van de Velde: Belt Buckle for Gertrud Osthaus 

(1898/99) 

Van de Velde carried out his first experiments 

in abstract ornamentation on twodimensional 

images, for example, as book 

designs or advertising posters. But shortly 

before 1900, he also started to apply his 

structures of dynamic lines to craft work – 

as is evident, for example, in his design for 

this belt buckle. 

Henry van de Velde: Belt Buckle for Gertrud Osthaus 

(1898/99) 

Van de Velde designed this silver belt 

buckle in the late 1890s. The buckle resembles 

a relief of dynamic sinuous lines. 

From early on in his artistic career, van de 

Velde had been fascinated by linearity – 

for example, as found in nature. In his 

memoirs, he recalls how in 1890, when he 

was staying on the North Sea coast, he often 

went down the beach: “(...) to sketch 

the linear arabesques left by the receding 

waves in the sand. Earlier, I had already 

been fascinated by similar shapes in the 

dunes: (...) sophisticated abstract decorations 

drawn by wind in the sand.” 

Later, van de Velde also addressed the theory 

of the line and its laws of movement. 

Through his use of dynamic lines, he 

hoped to develop decorative elements that 

were no longer figural, but purely abstract. 

In an essay written in 1901, he noted: “(...) 

it was the thought that lines stand in an 

equally logical and consistent relationship 

with each other as numbers and notes in 

music which led me to search for a purely 

abstract decorative art which derives its 

beauty from itself (...).” 


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705: Henry Van de Velde: Abstract Plant Composition (1893) 

Elsewhere, he describes how his abstract 

use of line was inspired by nature, and not 

just by Van Gogh. 

But what was it that led Henry van de 

Velde to give up painting altogether? To 

find out, just key in 1. 

Henry Van de Velde: Abstract Plant Composition 

(1893) 

Is this a plant? Or an abstract image – perhaps 

a line study? It is hard to say – and 

only the pumpkin in the lower right hand 

corner can actually be identified as a plant 

with any certainty. 

This pastel, painted in 1893, is a key work 

in van de Velde’s œuvre. It clearly reflects 

his move away from painting and sketching 

towards artistic works with a universal 

message – and, moreover, to entirely structuring 

his works through dynamic linearity 

and decorative elements. After painting in 

an Impressionist or neo-impressionist style 

for many years, van de Velde adopted an 

increasingly abstract style. In this development, 

he was primarily interested in linearity. 

The fascination with the power of lines 

remained with him throughout his life and 

was a major influence on his work. He 

wrote about this fascination in his memoirs: 

“Even after I had abandoned painting, 

the demon of lines has not left me and 

when I was creating the first ornaments, 

they came into being out of a dynamic interplay 

of their elementary forces.“ 

Second level: 

After the early death of his mother in 

1888, Henry van de Velde withdrew into 

himself. He started to read philosophy intensively 

including, for example, the 

works of Friedrich Nietzsche. 

He was also influenced by the writings of 

John Ruskin and William Morris, the initiators 

of the English Arts and Crafts Movement, 

who criticised industrial mass production. 

Since, in their view, aesthetic design 

in industrial production was constantly 

degraded, both Ruskin and Morris 

called for a radical shift to create everyday 

objects from the best materials in solid, 

craft quality, and with clear designs. 

William Morris in particular regarded a 

return to craftwork as one element in an 

overall artistic and social reform which 

would also upgrade the status of craftwork 

in relation to the ‘high arts’. His credo was 

that high quality art and craftwork could 

positively influence both individuals and 

everyday life. 

Van de Velde was particularly impressed 

by Morris' idea of art having a decisive 

role to play, especially in an industrial and 

technical society. Yet these ideas also led 

to an existential crisis. Van de Velde came 

to believe that painting was no longer an 

adequate means of expression. 

In the end, from 1893, he turned to the applied 

arts, and later to architecture. 

This abstract study of plants was one of his 

last paintings. 


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706: Henry van de Velde: Blue Tea Gown with wide, decorative 

border (c. 1896, replica 1964) 

Henry van de Velde: Blue Tea Gown with wide, 

decorative border (c. 1896, replica 1964) 

Just imagine how a woman of polite society 

was dressed at the end of the 19th century. 

Her waist laced into a tight corset, she 

wore ample layers of heavy petticoats under 

an hourglass-shaped gown lavishly 

decorated with lace and ornaments. In 

comparison, the blue tea gown on display 

here is radically different. This wide gown 

falls straight to the floor, was comfortable 

to wear and adapted easily to the movements 

of the wearer’s body – and allowed 

her to breathe freely. And what a relief that 

must have been! 

Around 1900, the fashionable restrictive, 

corseted gowns were criticised by physicians, 

social reformers and women’s rights 

campaigners, who all advocated a ‘reform 

dress’, which were essentially flowing, uncorseted 

gowns. Artists like Henry van de 

Velde felt called on to design modern 

‘healthy’ women’s clothing able to meet 

high aesthetic standards as well. 

This is a replica of his Tea Gown – a 

dress to be worn for afternoon tea at 

home. 

As you may have already noticed, the design 

is again clearly indebted to van de 

Velde’s principle of linearity – evident, 

for example, in the decorative borders. 

The seams are accentuated to make the 

structure of the dress visible. The wide cut 

allows a recognisable shape without unduly 

emphasising the female form – and 

was intended to pave the way for modern 

yet timeless women’s clothing decorated 

with abstract and linear elements. 

But van de Velde’s vision of his aesthetic 

reform gown replacing Parisian fashion 

never became a reality. Not only were his 

aesthetic standards too high, but the elaborate 

gown was too expensive to produce 

as a handmade item. In the end, van de 

Velde’s dress designs were mainly worn 

by his wife, Maria Sèthe. She was also an 

artist, and played an important part in van 

de Velde’s work. 

Find out more about Maria Sèthe by keying 

in 2. 


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2: Maria Séthe 

Second level: 

Maria Sèthe not only wore the dresses designed 

by her husband, but also largely 

made them herself. Maria was her husband’s 

invaluable supporter and helper. 

Just like him, she too gave considerable 

thought to the reform of women’s clothing. 

Moreover, she was an artist in her own 

right, creating, for example, embroideries 

as a cottage industry. 

Maria Sèthe’s father was a Dutch textile 

manufacturer and her mother a German 

musician. Her family was well-off and took 

a keen interest in all things cultural. She 

grew up in in Paris and Brussels, studying 

painting with the Flemish neoimpressionist 

Théo van Rysselberghe, who 

introduced her to Henry. 

In 1893, they spent a holiday together in 

the Dutch countryside with some fellow 

artists. Maria and Henry fell in love, and 

she encouraged him to give up painting and 

dedicate his energies to the applied arts. 

During her time spent as a student in London, 

she had also come into contact with 

the Arts and Crafts movement there and 

enthusiastically supported their programme 

for reform. 

From then on, Maria and Henry van de 

Velde were united in pursuing the idea of 

driving forwards a similar arts and crafts 

reform movement in Belgian, and later in 

Germany. 


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707: Henry van de Velde: Bloemenwerf Dining Table (1895) 

When German Impressionist painter Max 

Liebermann was looking for an architect 

and van de Velde’s name was suggested, 

Liebermann is said to have replied: 

‘When I furnish my apartment, I want to 

have the fun with it – and not Van de 

Velde.” 

Henry van de Velde: Bloemenwerf Dining Table 

In 1895, van de Velde designed a house 

known as Bloemenwerf for himself and his 

wife Maria in Uccle, today a suburb of 

Brussels. He did not simply design the 

house itself, but also created the entire interior 

furnishings – even though he was selftaught 

in both of these areas. 

The visitors to Bloemenwerf were especially 

impressed by the dining table. Here, rather 

than including any of the usual decorative 

elements, van de Velde’s design focused 

entirely on function. The table’s 

most exceptional feature was a slightly 

raised ceramic panel set into the centre. 

Thanks to this ingenious addition, hot serving 

bowls could be placed centrally on the 

table. Later, the ceramic panel was replaced 

by a panel made of brass. 

Van de Velde’s fascination with the unity 

of the arts also led him to design the door 

handles and wallpaper in his Bloemenwerf 

house. This approach reflected his view 

that a house was a Gesamtkunstwerk, 

which should, in every detail, express the 

personality of its occupants. Without 

doubt, that idea worked very well – but 

only as long as van de Velde was building 

for himself. 


10

708: Henry van de Velde: Barber’s workstation for the 

François Haby Barber Salon (c. 1901) 

In 1900, van de Velde was commissioned 

to redesign the elegant interior of François 

Haby’s barber salon in Berlin. Since Haby 

was barber to Emperor Wilhelm II, the 

work stations were made only of the finest 

materials – mahogany and green marble. 

But the real revolution in this workstation 

is not in the materials. As is only too obvious, 

van de Velde did not enclose the brass 

gas and water pipes under wooden cladding. 

Instead, he left them exposed, their 

soft lines gracefully curving around the 

dark wood. In retrospect, van de Velde 

himself took a rather critical view of his 

design, writing in his memoirs: “To make 

the actual purpose of the things and their 

shapes clear, and to show their function, I 

tended to restrict myself to skeletons, and 

forgot to surround them with flesh. But 

only then does the design appear in its perfect 

form, divine as in the bodies of people 

and animals.” 

Van de Velde’s unusual interior design 

triggered quite a debate as soon as the 

salon opened. The leading German Impressionist 

artist Max Liebermann certainly 

looked down his nose at it. When he 

saw the exposed pipes, he is reported to 

have said: “You don’t wear your guts like 

a watch chain across your waistcoat.” 

Henry van de Velde: Barber’s workstation for the 

François Haby Barber Salon (c. 1901) 

But this did nothing to diminish Haby’s 

success. This star barber did not only earn 

money with his salon, but also with his 

range of men’s cosmetic products. His 

best-known product by far was a grooming 

pack for handlebar moustaches. The 

pack, called Es ist erreicht – roughly ‘It is 

achieved’–, comprised a moustache cosmetic 

and moustache band for the night. 

With the cosmetic application, the ends of 

the handlebar moustache could be twisted 

upwards, as worn by Emperor Wilhelm II 

– and at that time, the latest craze in 

moustache fashion. The moustache band 

was worn at night to ensure the moustache 

kept its shape. 


11

709: Henry van de Velde: Tropon Advertising Poster (1897/98) 

Henry van de Velde: Tropon Advertising Poster 

(1897/98) 

Van de Velde did not only design the 

poster for Tropon. As you can see here, he 

also designed a metal box for ‘Tropon 

Biscuits’, and a cookery book cover. 

In fact, he drafted all Tropon’s packaging, 

labels and advertising, created a logo, laid 

out the company’s offices, and even designed 

the company’s stationary and envelopes 

–– the earliest example of a 

‘corporate design’ in the modern sense. 

In his design for this poster, Henry van de 

Velde broke new ground. In 1898, he was 

one of the very first artists to design an advertising 

poster for an industrial company. 

Van de Velde’s approach was revolutionary. 

Rather than designing the standard 

‘speaking image’ used in advertising at that 

time, he combined stylised Art Nouveau 

lines and surfaces to create an abstract pattern. 

The only reference to the product is 

the company name at the top ‘Tropon’ and 

the product below ‘Eiweiss Nahrung’ – 

protein supplement. This nutritional supplement, 

produced from vegetable and animal 

protein, was supposed to support a 

healthier and more balanced diet. 

From the mid-19th century, the general diet 

changed fundamentally. While the previous 

staple foods had largely been cereals, pulses 

and potatoes, increasing prosperity led 

to a growth in the consumption of animal 

products, particularly meat. 

Leading nutritionists supported this desire 

for meat, claiming to have identified the 

protein in meat as a guarantor of energy 

and health. As the food industry responded 

to this surge in demand, it also created a 

new sector – dietary supplements, tonics 

and cordials. 


12

710: Gustave Serrurier-Bovy: Silex Armchair (c. 1905) 

Further along to the right, you can also 

see the striking ‘Sitzmaschine’ – literally, 

a ‘machine for sitting’ – by Viennese designer 

Josef Hoffmann. The 

‘Sitzmachine’ was also made in series 

production – and it is just what the name 

says. 

Thanks to the stringent geometrical 

shapes of the individual pieces and the 

adjustable back, the armchair has a 

strongly machine-like appearance, almost 

as if it could roar off at any moment. 

Gustave Serrurier-Bovy: Silex Armchair (c. 1905) 

Around 1900, Henry van de Velde was far 

from being the only product designer who 

rejected historical-revivalist styles and 

sought instead to develop an authentic contemporary 

design. 

Fellow Belgian architect and gifted cabinet 

maker Gustave Serrurier-Bovy, for example, 

also wanted to entirely re-design people’s 

everyday surroundings. 

Serrurier-Bovy is known particularly for 

his Silex range of furniture – to which this 

armchair belongs. 

The Silex line was produced as early ready 

-to-assemble furniture in kit form. When 

Serrurier-Bovy unveiled his Silex series to 

the public in 1905, it was a revolution in 

the history of design – the equivalent, as it 

were, of inventing the principle behind 

IKEA furniture. And with low production 

costs, design furniture was, for the first 

time, affordable for more than just the 

wealthy classes. 


13

711: Henry van de Velde: Writing Desk (1903) 

Henry van de Velde: Writing Desk (1903) 

In 1898, Van de Velde was invited to take 

part in the annual exhibition of the artists’ 

association known as the Munich Secession. 

At that time, Munich was the art centre 

in Imperial Germany, ranked even before 

Berlin and Dresden. 

Van de Velde designed an entire room at 

the exhibition with items including the furnishings 

for his ‘Study in Oak’. At the centre 

of the study stood the wonderful desk 

you can see here – one of Van de Velde’s 

best known pieces of furniture. 

You have no doubt already noticed its most 

prominent feature – its curved shape This 

was intended to reflect the natural radius of 

the human arm so that anyone sitting at the 

desk could easily reach all the writing implements 

and documents. 

Around 1900, van de Velde was one of a 

number of designers and architects across 

Europe interested in revitalising the arts 

and crafts. They all rejected the prevalent 

historical-revivalist styles, and were trying 

to develop a new style reflecting the modern 

zeitgeist. The key centres in this aesthetic 

development included Vienna, Munich, 

Darmstadt and Glasgow. In this room 

you can see how differently the artists in 

these four centres imagined a contemporary 

style. 


14

712: Erica von Scheel: Student’s Work: Vinegar and Oil Bottles 

(c. 1903) 

Erica von Scheel: Student’s Work: Vinegar and Oil 

Bottles (c. 1903) 

These simple yet elegant containers for oil, 

vinegar and flour were designed by Erica 

von Scheel, one of van de Velde’s first private 

students in Weimar. 

In 1902, van de Velde moved to Weimar 

when Wilhelm Ernst, Grand Duke of Saxe- 

Weimar, appointed him as artistic advisor 

for the trades and industry. Van de Velde’s 

remit was to support businesses in the region 

in all design issues with the aim of 

fostering the applied arts in Thuringia and 

making them competitive. The Kunstgewerbliches 

Seminar, the Arts and Crafts 

Seminar, founded in 1902 was the first 

contact address for trades and industry 

where they could not only receive advice, 

but also models for new products. 

Van de Velde was perfect for the job. He 

had already headed workshops in Brussels 

and Berlin, and was a pioneer of cultural 

renewal. In Weimar, he deliberately moved 

away from the traditions of the Goethe era, 

promoting instead a modern, contemporary 

style. The School of Arts and Crafts, with 

van de Velde at its head, was also organised 

in this spirit. The School building was 

ready to move into in 1906, and opened 

officially two years later with 27 students. 

It was supposed to foster a new generation 

of talented draughtsmen and women, 

and modellers. In his memoirs, van de 

Velde wrote: “Students were not expected 

to have any knowledge of past styles. Rather 

than familiarising themselves with 

products from the past, they were trained 

to recognise the essentials in the design of 

a range of objects (...). From that moment, 

students could only turn to rational design 

as their sole resource in solving problems 

in construction or inventing forms and 

decorative elements.” 

Erica von Scheel also attended the School 

of Arts and Crafts. In her first year there, 

her designs already won awards at a number 

of competitions. In 1910, she moved 

to Paris, creating batik textiles and clothes 

for the famous fashion designer Paul Poiret. 


15

713: Henry van de Velde: Dinner Service for 10 people 

(1903/04) 

Henry van de Velde: Dinner Service for 10 people 

(1903/04) 

This is part of an extensive Meissen porcelain 

dinner service designed by van de 

Velde. 

Fritz Schumacher, architect and urban 

planner, wrote about him: “Never before 

may a single individual have displayed 

such multi-talented production in all areas 

of objects for home use.” 

What was behind van de Velde’s approach, 

though, was his idea of making art and design 

relevant to all spheres of daily life, 

from A to Z. Ideally, in his view, a house 

should be regarded as a kind of inhabitable 

Gesamtkunstwerk – a unity of the arts, 

where art and life are merged and fused. 

Ultimately, he set out to create an aesthetic, 

practical and positive environment to serve 

the balance and harmony necessary for 

psychological and emotional health. 

It is remarkable that Van de Velde was not 

an expert in all these different areas. Instead, 

he carried out many commissions 

through a process of learning by doing. 

Sometimes, it didn’t work out – for example, 

his gravy boat which dripped when the 

gravy was poured. But in the majority of 

cases his lack of expertise was an advantage; 

since he had no previous 

knowledge of a topic, he could approach it 

impartially and develop completely new 

solutions. 

This dinner service was produced between 

1903 and 1904, shortly after Van 

de Velde arrived in Weimar. In the town, 

he was not only in demand as a multitalented 

artist and teacher, but soon 

showed that he could also shine as a host. 

The evening get-togethers at van de 

Velde’s house often included illustrious 

guests, for example the Austrian writer 

Hugo von Hofmannsthal, or Jean Jaurès, 

the French Socialist leader and antimilitarist 

assassinated in 1914. 


(1903/04) 


(1903/04) 


16

714: Johanna Brinkhaus: Wax Batik on Silk 

For van de Velde, the linear expressed a 

psychological truth. In his view, decorative 

lines have a logical relationship to 

each other, rather like numbers or musical 

notes. 

Johanna Brinkhaus’ batik works must 

have reflected his views, since they were 

awarded a prize at an exhibition of students’ 

works in 1913. 

Johanna Brinkhaus: Wax Batik on Silk 

Students at van de Velde’s School of Arts 

and Crafts in Weimar produced a wide 

range of art – including, for instance, this 

wax batik design on silk by the student Johanna 

Brinkhaus. 

The pattern is inspired by textile art on the 

island of Java. Wax-dyed batik cloth has a 

long tradition throughout Indonesia. In Europe, 

batik gradually became known in the 

19th century through English and Dutch 

traders. In 1900, shortly before Johanna 

Brinkhaus created her batik design, Indonesian 

batik had created a sensation at the 

World’s Fair in Paris. However, the batik 

also clearly reveals the influence of van de 

Velde’s ideas of design. 

The ‘Principles of Decorative Design’ was 

one of the foundation courses at the Grand 

Ducal Saxon School of Arts and Crafts, 

and was based on van de Velde’s wellknown 

theory of linearity. He described the 

line as: “…a vital force spontaneously 

breaking out of us, soaring and sinking 

back, gliding and coiling forwards, raising 

us up and transporting our soul into a state 

only otherwise awakened by singing and 

dancing.” 


17

715: Henry van de Velde: Wax Batik on Silk(c. 1905) 

Shortly after van der Velde arrived in Weimar 

in 1902, he set up the Kunstgewerbliches 

Seminar, a kind of design laboratory, 

intended to improve cooperation between 

artists and industry as quickly as possible. 

There, artisans and industrial producers 

could have their products analysed and improved 

for free. 

Van de Velde had ambitious plans. Initially, 

he even believed that with the help of 

his design laboratory he could establish a 

new contemporary style across the region. 

He wrote to the Grand Duke: “I understand 

the task which your Royal Highness has 

entrusted me with as nothing else than being 

asked to contribute to creating the 

style of the 20th century.” 

Henry van de Velde: Letter Opener (c. 1905) 

This elegantly curved letter opener was 

designed by Henry van de Velde himself. 

However, he left the production and sales 

of his letter opener to craftsmen carvers in 

Ruhla in the Thuringian Forest. 

One of Van de Velde’s main tasks in Weimar 

was to improve product design among 

regional craft workers, and make the products 

marketable. His employment contract 

stated that he was to: “…provide expert 

advice for artisans and industrialists (...) of 

this country (...) in questions of art and (...) 

give them an artistic stimulus by preparing 

pattern drawings, models and samples….” 

Van de Velde also advised artisans and 

businesses in Thuringia on new production 

methods and product marketing. Until 

Van der Velde arrived in Weimar, the 

pottery in the little town of Bürgel had 

kept to its traditional designs. Since these 

were no longer marketable, sales had 

steadily fallen. To support the pottery producers, 

Van de Velde quickly designed 

new crockery, as well as affordable vases 

and bowls, and arranged exhibitions of 

their goods to attract new customers. 


18

716: Georg Kolbe: Portrait of Harry Graf Kessler (1916) 

Georg Kolbe: Portrait of Harry Graf Kessler, 

(1916) 

Without this man, van de Velde’s life 

would probably have taken a very different 

course. This portrait head by sculptor 

Georg Kolbe shows Harry Graf Kessler – 

one of the most colourful figures in the 

very different Germanies before and after 

the First World War. 

Harry Graf Kessler was a diplomat, writer, 

art collector and art patron. Today, he is 

best known for the diary he kept for over 

fifty years from 1880 until his death in 

1937. His diary mentions the names of 

around 12,000 of his contemporaries, from 

German Chancellor Bismarck to Albert 

Einstein and Joséphine Baker – so no wonder 

Kessler was regarded as someone who 

keenly ‘collected people’. He was also an 

outstanding connoisseur and patron of 

contemporary art. The walls of his Berlin 

bachelor apartment, and later his apartment 

in Weimar, were hung with works 

by van Gogh, Cézanne, Renoir and Seurat. 

He commissioned the elegant furniture 

for his apartment from van de Velde, 

who he had known before he moved to 

Weimar. 

Together with Elisabeth Förster- 

Nietzsche, Kessler was also instrumental 

in bringing van de Velde to Weimar as a 

source of inspiration and innovation in the 

applied arts. Förster-Nietzsche and Kessler 

wanted to turn the little town of Weimar 

into a flourishing culture centre for a 

third time – after Weimar Classicism and 

the age of Franz Liszt. For this reason, 

Kessler took up an appointment as the 

director of the Grand Ducal Museum of 

Arts and Crafts in 1903. 

Through Kessler’s excellent contacts, the 

museum was able to show the very latest 

European art. But Kessler’s all too ambitious 

plans soon had conservative circles 

in Weimar up in arms. In 1906, he was 

attacked in the press for allegedly obscene 

nude studies by Rodin. As a result, Kessler 

resigned from his position in Weimar 

– and dedicated himself to his appreciation 

of art as a private individual. 


19

717: Henry van de Velde: Wicker Chair (1908) 

Henry van de Velde: Wicker Chair (1908) 

Although van de Velde created a completely 

new design for the basket weavers 

in Thuringia, this was something of an 

exception. Normally, a company’s product 

designers came to van de Velde’s offices 

in Weimar with their own designs to 

ask for his advice. There, under his supervision 

or the supervision of one of his 

assistants, the designs were reviewed and 

revised. The improved products were then 

made in series production. 

For van de Velde, this process was intended 

to ensure that the industrial or craft 

firms were not forced to adopt completely 

new ideas. After all, producing totally 

new models would have involved a major 

restructuring of production – and that 

would have entailed a far greater economic 

risk. 

As part of his work to support craftwork in 

Thuringia, van de Velde also visited 

Tannroda, around fifteen kilometres south 

of Weimar. For centuries, Tannroda had 

been an important centre for the basket 

making industry, but business was flagging. 

To stimulate the industry again, van 

de Velde recommended that the basket 

makers not only make wicker baskets but 

also wicker furniture – just like this elegant 

armchair designed by van de Velde. 

Van de Velde’s suggestion was a resounding 

success. From then on, even the upscale 

Wertheim department store in Berlin 

always had a collection of wicker furniture 

from Tannroda on offer. 

In terms of design, the wicker armchair is a 

good example of how van de Velde’s style 

changed while he was in Weimar. There is 

little left of the opulence of his early designs. 

Instead, shapes have become more 

simple, influenced by a functional elegance. 


20

718: Henry Van de Velde: Nursery Table (1911) 

nurseries – for example, the ‘Interior Decoration’ 

magazine from 1903 explained 

that nursery furniture should: 

“…stimulate a child’s fantasy and encourage 

its creative abilities.” 

Henry Van de Velde: Nursery Table (1911) 

This table belonged to a set of nursery furniture 

van de Velde designed in 1911 for 

Berlin businessman Willy Engels. 

The table is yet another example of Van de 

Velde’s pioneering designs. For many 

years, architects and interior designers almost 

entirely ignored the particular needs 

of children. Even in the late 19th century, 

well-to-do families usually had the children’s 

nursery fitted out with almost exactly 

the same kind of furnishings as in the 

rooms for adults. Of course, the apartments 

of the working class and less well-off 

would not have had a children’s room. 

However, the idea that children need a 

place to retreat to only became widely established 

across all classes of society after 

the Second World War. 

The initial moves in this direction in Germany 

can be traced back to around 1900 – 

and to the Lebensreform movement, which 

propagated a back-to-nature lifestyle. Followers 

of this movement also wanted to 

completely revamp home décor. They rejected 

the gloomy rooms with overladen 

interiors that had been standard for almost 

fifty years. Instead, they called for bright 

rooms with fresh air, and clear lines. And 

they also turned their attention to children’s 

As you can see, van de Velde’s design 

embraced all aspects of the children’s 

nursery – reflecting the spirit of the Lebensreform 

proponents. Just as with his 

other interior designs, the nursery was 

also intended to improve and ennoble 

those living there. 


21

719: Henry van de Velde: Draft Design for the Director’s 

Room (1908) 

But Weimar’s Grand Duke Wilhelm Ernst 

did not find these designs particularly attractive, 

and hesitated over approving 

them. 

Initially, work was to start at some indefinite 

time in the future, but ultimately the 

plan was shelved altogether. 

Henry van de Velde: Draft Design for the Director’s 

Room (1908) 

Van de Velde designed this ensemble of 

writing desk, chain and table lamp for exactly 

the place we are now. 

In 1907, he was commissioned to revamp 

and refurbish this old building – at that 

time housing the Grand Ducal Museum for 

the Duchy of Weimar-Saxony-Eisenach. 

Thanks to a series of coloured sketches, we 

know how he imagined the new furnishings 

in the individual rooms. 

The draft design for the Director’s Room is 

on the wall behind the desk. It gives a vivid 

impression of what the room would have 

looked like with van de Velde’s interior 

design – including this furniture. 

Among other things, his design is remarkable 

for the fact that the dominant linearity 

is not curvilinear but the straight line. This 

clear and functional style is in marked distinction 

to Van de Velde’s earlier interior 

designs, which often had sinuous decorative 

elements. 


22

720: Henry van de Velde: Home Hohe Pappeln (Model) 

Henry van de Velde: Haus Hohe Pappeln 

Between July 1907 and March 1908, van 

de Velde had a house built for his family 

on the outskirts of Weimar. He called the 

home ‘Hohe Pappeln’ – literally ‘High 

Poplars’. This is the only private residence 

designed by van de Velde which is now a 

museum and open to the public. 

Our model shows that the ground plan of 

the house resembles a ship – with the bow 

as the pointed entrance area. The façade is 

asymmetrical and appears to comprise a 

complex system of interlocking sections. 

There are edges, angles and projecting elements 

everywhere, with a few bay windows 

here, and a loggia there. One very 

prominent feature is the high hipped roof, 

which the house wears rather like a bonnet 

over the top floor and attics. 

The home Hohe Pappeln is one of four private 

residences that van de Velde designed 

for his family in the space of around 30 

years. As early as 1895, he created the 

Bloemenwerf house near Brussels – and 

you can see interior furnishings from that 

house on the top floor of this museum. In 

the 1920s, van de Velde then built the de 

Tent house on the Dutch North Sea coast 

and La Nouvelle Maison, also in a suburb 

of Brussels. 

If you compare the four models, you’ll notice 

the houses share many common features. 

For example, rather than reviving 

historical styles, van de Velde relies entirely 

on his own powers of invention. 

The facades are always functional: they 

are neither rendered or decorated with 

ornamental elements. 

The Hohe Pappeln, Bloemenwerf and de 

Tent houses are particularly similar. Van 

de Velde designed all three from inside 

out – in other words, the structure of the 

interior rooms determined the shape of the 

façades. In comparison, La Nouvelle Maison 

from 1927 appears more functional 

and modern – in this case, the façade 

comprises simple geometric shapes under 

a flat roof. 


23

721: Henry van de Velde: Dumont Theatre Draft Design 

(1904), Werkbund Theatre (1913-14) 

Henry van de Velde: Dumont Theatre Draft Design 

(1904), Werkbund Theatre (1913-14) 

Van de Velde’s theatre projects were very 

influential in the development of theatre 

architecture in the early 20th century. This 

water colour sketch shows a draft design 

for the Dumont Theatre from 1904. Louise 

Dumont, a famous Ibsen actress, was planning 

to found a centre for a theatre festival 

in Weimar – modelled on, and competing 

with, the Wagner Festival at Bayreuth. But 

the Weimar court circles were against her, 

and her plan came to nothing. Most interestingly, 

the sketch shows that van de 

Velde did not use columns to give a structural 

shape to the front elevation, but 

achieved the same effect with slender metal 

poles. He was constantly looking for alternatives 

to the omnipresent columned architectural 

designs, which he felt were no 

longer in keeping with the times. 

Yet van de Velde had to wait until 1914 

before he could actually see one of his theatres 

built – and there’s a model of the theatre 

on the left (right). The theatre was constructed 

for the Cologne exhibition of the 

Deutscher Werkbund, an association of 

architects, designers and industrialists. The 

Werkbund show involved over fifty new 

buildings on the site of today’s Cologne 

Trade Fair Centre and was a major exhibition 

of contemporary architecture. 

The exhibition’s accompanying programme 

included a conference where 

fierce debates broke out over the Werkbund’s 

future direction. Architect Hermann 

Muthesius had prepared and distributed 

ten guiding principles in advance to 

all the Werkbund members, calling for 

architecture and the applied arts to follow 

a binding canon of design. Van de Velde 

reacted immediately to the threat of strict 

guidelines. In a Cologne hotel, he noted 

down ten counter guiding principles, and 

attacked Muthesius head-on with them at 

the conference. Van de Velde’s principles 

stated: “In their innermost being, artists 

are ardent individualists, free, spontaneous 

creators. They will never submit voluntarily 

to a discipline forcing a stylistic 

canon onto them.” 


24

722: Henry van de Velde: Draft Drawing of the Nietzsche 

Monument (1912) 

Henry van de Velde: Draft Drawing of the Nietzsche 

Monument (1912) 

A real cult developed around the philosopher 

Friedrich Nietzsche at the close of the 

19th century, and especially after his death 

in 1900. The house where he died, which 

became a popular place of pilgrimage, is 

today’s Nietzsche Archive in Weimar – 

and you should certainly take the chance to 

see it while you are in Weimar. 

Henry van de Velde converted the house 

for Nietzsche and his sister and designed 

the interiors. But there were larger plans in 

the air. Here, you can see Henry van de 

Velde’s preliminary draft for a Nietzsche 

Monument. The idea for such a memorial 

came from Nietzsche’s sister Elisabeth and 

Harry Graf Kessler, who approached Van 

de Velde to be the architect. Initially, the 

monument was to be a small temple structure 

on a plot below the Archive. But soon 

the plans became more ambitious. Kessler 

imagined the Nietzsche Monument as a 

Greek temple complex, complete with 

temple and grove, as well as a stadium for 

sports competitions. This was, in his 

view, the only way of combining physical 

and intellectual power and beauty – perfectly 

reflecting the spirit of Nietzsche. 

Van de Velde provided a number of designs, 

but Kessler was not happy with any 

of them. In this sketch, for example, he 

found the temple too oppressive and 

heavy. It seems as if this project pushed 

van de Velde to his very limits. For a long 

time, there had been no doubt about his 

intuitive feeling for such functional buildings 

as residential houses – but that approach 

was no help in tackling a purely 

decorative structure. Disillusioned, Kessler 

wrote in his diary: “Without the 

prompt of utility, his imagination cannot 

focus.” 

Ultimately, the Nietzsche Monument remained 

a pipedream. With no definite 

financing in prospect, the project was 

shelved in winter 1913 – and never revived. 


25

723: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner: “Head of van de Velde 

(light)” (1917) 

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner: “Head of van de Velde 

(light)” (1917) 

Many renowned artists produced a portrait 

of Henry van de Velde during the course of 

his life. This woodcut of a reflective van de 

Velde set against a mountainous landscape 

is especially powerful. In van de Velde’s 

haunting expression, the woodcut mirrors 

the difficult time of his life when this portrait 

was made. 

This work is by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, the 

famous German expressionist painter and 

graphic artist. He executed the woodcut in 

summer 1917 – in the middle of the First 

World War – while both artists were living 

in exile in Switzerland. Van de Velde, at 

that time 54 years old, had recently moved 

to Berne. As an ‘enemy alien’, he had only 

been able to obtain an exit visa from Germany 

through the intervention of influential 

friends. 

His wife Maria and their five children had 

to stay in Germany. The family lived 

apart for nearly two years. Only Nele, 

their oldest daughter, was allowed to follow 

her father some time later. She often 

visited Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, who gave 

her – as his only student – lessons in 

drawing and printing techniques. Kirchner’s 

influence is clearly evident in Nele’s 

works, as you can see from two of her 

woodcuts on show in this room. 

In the war years, van de Velde became a 

paternal friend for Kirchner, who was seriously 

ill. He supported Kirchner as best 

as he could, even though his own financial 

situation was similarly difficult. After 

the end of the war in 1918, van de Velde 

wanted to found an artists’ colony in the 

Swiss town of Uttwil on Lake Constance 

– and Kirchner’s move to join him was 

already planned. 

But van de Velde’s dream came to nothing. 

In Switzerland, he found neither commissions 

nor students. A little later he 

went to Holland. 

But Ernst Ludwig Kirchner remained in 

Switzerland – spending the rest of his life 

there until he committed suicide in 1938. 


26

724: Henry van de Velde: Kettle with réchaud (1922-1925) 

Henry van de Velde: Kettle with réchaud (1922- 

1925) 

The tea-kettle is completely spherical, 

while the device below to heat the water is 

all rectangles and edges. Add a few rivets 

and the bright shine of polished brass – 

with everything extremely simple and reduced 

to a few basic shapes. 

This ensemble was created by Henry van 

de Velde between 1922 and 25 – in a thoroughly 

modern and bold design. The teakettle 

with its heater, known as a réchaud, 

belonged to a tea service for the Dutch 

businessman Anton Kröller and his wife 

Helene Kröller-Müller. 

The wealthy couple played a decisive role 

in van de Velde’s life, helping him to recover 

from the financial and personal crises 

during the First World War. In autumn1919, 

van de Velde received a letter 

from the Kröller-Müllers from The 

Hague; they wanted to commission him as 

an architect on a number of building projects. 

Without a moment’s hesitation, van 

de Velde accepted – at last, he had a job, a 

task and an income! And so in 1920, he 

moved to Holland with his wife and children 

to start the next stage in his life. 

Initially, he was supposed to design a 

large villa for the Kröller-Müllers – with a 

private museum attached to hold the couple’s 

extensive collection of modern art. 

A little later, they decided to build a public 

museum. Here, you can see several 

designs for this massive and extremely 

expensive museum project. For his designs, 

Van de Velde was inspired by Assyrian 

architecture. In 1924, work on the 

building was suspended due to the financial 

crisis. Van de Velde was profoundly 

disappointed. 

The museum was only finally built thirteen 

years later, though much smaller than 

originally planned. Van de Velde extended 

the simple structure twice, and today it 

forms the core of the Kröller Müller Museums 

in Otterlo, Holland. 


27

725: Model of the ‘Prince Baudouin’ mail steamer (1934) 

Model of the ‘Prince Baudouin’ mail steamer 

(1934) 

A mail steamer? 

Yes, even ships belonged to the repertoire 

of the multi-talented Henry van de Velde. 

In the 1930s, he designed the mail steamer 

Prince Baudouin, on show here as a model, 

and a second ship as well. Van de Velde 

was responsible for the entire interior design, 

from the floors to furniture and the 

lamps, which are shown on the photos. Van 

de Velde also gave the steamer its very 

elegant shape. 

He received this extensive public commission 

from the Société Cockerill shipyard, at 

that time one of the largest industrial companies 

in Belgium. 

Van de Velde had returned to the country 

of his birth in 1926 – after spending over 

twenty-five years away, in Germany – first 

in Berlin, then in Weimar –, in Switzerland 

and, finally, in Holland. 

His old friend, author and socialist Camille 

Huysmans, now Minister for Arts and Education, 

had strongly advocated van de 

Velde’s return to the Belgian King. To 

begin with, van de Velde was often attacked 

in Belgium for his ‘pro-German’ 

attitudes. Yet after the initial difficulties, 

his new start in his old home country 

proved to be positive. Now well over 60 

years old, van de Velde was awarded numerous 

private and state commissions. 

Even after he officially retired in the mid- 

1930s, he was an active and busy consultant 

for the government. In this role, as 

you can also see in this room, he designed 

new railcars and their interiors for the 

Belgian state railways. 

Incidentally, the state railway logo he created 

at that time is still in use today. 


28

726: Max Elskamp: Salutations, dont d’angélique (1893) 

Books form one of the recurring themes 

running through van de Velde’s entire 

life, and he himself wrote numerous theoretical 

works. In that sense, it’s not that 

surprising to discover that when he first 

turned to craft work in the early 1890s, he 

was drawn to book design. 

In van de Velde’s opinion, the book had 

two functions. On the one hand, the contents 

should provide a stimulus for the 

reader and, on the other, its contents 

should be aesthetically presented – in other 

words, function and beauty are mutually 

dependent. 

Max Elskamp: Salutations, dont d’angélique (1893) 

The cover for Max Elskamp’s Salutations, 

dont d’angéliques, a volume of poetry, was 

one of van de Velde’s first book designs. 

In these early experiments, his designs 

were not completely free from figurative 

art. Max Elskamp, a Belgian poet, asked 

his friend van de Velde to align the cover 

design with the content. As a result, the 

decoration evokes the Annunciation scene, 

which is also referenced in the title of the 

collection – “Salutations, including angelic 

ones”. 

The lines also include the faintly suggested 

contours of an angel’s wings and halo of 

the Virgin Mary. 

Van de Velde confidently ignored all the 

prevailing practices of book design in his 

day. He was not interested in creating a 

cover which simply reflected or illustrated 

the content. Instead, he also wanted his 

abstract decorative design to evoke feelings 

and emotions – and to achieve that, he 

looked to the power of the line. 


29

727: Friedrich Nietzsche: Also sprach Zarathustra (Thus 

Spoke Zarathustra) (1908) 

The text is structured to resemble a column. 

On a trip to Italy, van de Velde was 

inspired by the simple, clear shapes of 

antiquity – and his textual column is decorated 

by a capital of golden decorative 

elements. He filled the gaps with smaller 

versions of the same pattern to represent 

the column’s surface. The colour gold is 

the only connection between the design 

and content. It creates the impression of 

the golden rays of the sun flashing off the 

stones of the textual column. When Zarathustra 

is introduced, his first words also 

address the sun. “You great star! What 

would your happiness be if you had not 

those for whom you shine!“ 

Friedrich Nietzsche: Also sprach Zarathustra (Thus 

Spoke Zarathustra) (1908) 

For ten years, Henry Van de Velde worked 

on the design of this book. In 1897, Harry 

Graf Kessler had commissioned his friend 

van de Velde to produce a deluxe edition of 

Also sprach Zarathustra – Thus Spoke Zarathustra 

– by the philosopher Friedrich 

Nietzsche. 

What an honour! Van de Velde had been 

intensively reading Nietzsche since the late 

1880s. Nietzsche’s writings had profoundly 

influenced him, and were one reason for 

his change of direction towards the arts and 

crafts. 

For this book, unlike his earlier designs, 

van de Velde exclusively employed abstract 

decorative elements. Moreover, he 

does not restrict his design to the cover, but 

also prescribed the paper, borders, ornaments, 

colours and typeface. 

‘Thus Spoke Zarathustra’ is Friedrich 

Nietzsche’s most famous work. There was 

a marked surge in interest in Nietzsche's 

writings after his death in 1900, and so it 

is hardly surprising that two-thirds of van 

de Velde’s luxury edition was already 

sold before it was published. 


30

728: Desk with book cases, UB Ghent (from 1920) 

Desk with book cases, UB Ghent (from 1920) 

This desk comes from the Ghent University 

Library, and was designed by Henry van de 

Velde in the mid-1930s, together with the 

entire library building for the Institute of 

Art History and Archaeology. On the photos, 

you can see the soaring ‘Boekentoren’ 

– Dutch for ‘Book Tower’ – today one of 

the Flemish city’s main landmarks. 

Incidentally, van de Velde had also 

worked at the University of Ghent – starting 

from 1926, the year he returned to 

Belgium. Even though he was self-taught, 

he had been officially appointed as a Professor 

of Design and Architecture. But the 

greatest honour he received was the state 

commissions for the Belgian pavilions at 

the World’s Fairs of 1937 and 39 in Paris 

and New York. These works also brought 

van de Velde well-deserved though belated 

fame in his own country. 

The University Library was one of van de 

Velde’s largest architectural projects in his 

long career. Although this major building 

complex could only be completed in stages 

due to the outbreak of the Second World 

War, it was nonetheless actually finished – 

as were all the other state architectural 

commissions van de Velde received after 

his return to Belgium. This fact was, for 

him personally, a cause of great joy and 

belated gratification, since his early projects 

had too often come to nothing. It was 

not without a certain pride that he recounted 

in his memoirs an incident with former 

US President Herbert Hoover: “When the 

ambassador asked Hoover what had been 

his strongest impression on his short visit 

to Belgium, the former President answered: 

‘The library tower in Gent, of course!’ The 

ambassador had expected any other answer.” 


31

729: Oscar Jespers: Portrait of Henry van de Velde (c. 1930) 

Oscar Jespers: Portrait of Henry van de Velde 

(c. 1930) 

During the Second World War, he was 

involved as an artistic advisor on rebuilding 

roads and bridges – under the German 

occupying forces. For this reason, he was 

accused of collaboration with the Nazis 

after the war. The animosity towards van 

de Velde was so intense that in 1947, 

when he was 84 years old, he decided to 

leave his native country again. 

With the help of friends, he found a place 

to live in a small village in Switzerland. 

There, he spent the last ten years of his 

life, largely occupied with writing his 

memoirs – and working on them for up to 

eight hours a day. 

Van de Velde, the ‘father of the New 

Style’ died in Zurich in 1957, aged 94. 

In this granite portrait bust, Belgian sculptor 

Oscar Jespers has exaggerated the shape 

of Van de Velde’s strikingly elongated 

head. The style of this conical sculpture 

distantly evokes works by indigenous artists. 

Jespers was one of the teachers at the design 

school Institut Supérieur des Arts Décoratifs, 

which Van de Velde founded in 

1926 in Brussels at the request of the Belgian 

government. 

Here, just as at the School of Arts and 

Crafts in Weimar, the guiding principle 

was ‘rational design’. In his memoirs, van 

de Velde called the new Institute in Brussels 

the ‘third citadel of modernity’ – after 

the School of Arts and Crafts and Bauhaus. 

When the Institut Supérieur was opened, 

van de Velde was already well over 60 

years old, but Belgium was not to be the 

last phase of his life. 


32

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