Inhoudsopgave:
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A deserted Paris house holds the mystery of a brilliant Viennese modernist who worked alongside Le Corbusier and Adolf Loos before vanishing. A leading painter still highly regarded in South Africa, Jean Welz's prior architectural career has been virtually unknown until a string of discoveries unfolded for author and filmmaker Peter Wyeth, allowing him to narrate this amazing true tale of genius. Trained in ultra-sophisticated, but conservative Vienna, Welz was sent to Paris for the 1925 Art Deco exhibition by his influential employer, renowned architect Josef Hoffmann. There he met preeminent modern architects Le Corbusier and Adolf Loos. The latter employed him to assist in building a house for the founder of Dada, Tristan Tzara. They all mixed in avant-garde circles at the Dôme Café in Montparnasse along with Welzâs classmate from Vienna, later Chicago-based architect Gabriel Guevrekian; Welzâs future employer Raymond Fischer, whose archive was mostly destroyed by Nazis; and photographer André Kertész. Through Welzâs South African family archive, author Wyeth retrieves stories, letters, portfolios, and photographs generations after Welzâs death that unravel his heroic designs, his stunning built critique of Corbusierâs âFive Points of Architecture,â a gravestone for Marxâs daughter, and the many ways that Welz disappeared amongst his collaborators, intentionally and not. This account of why Jean Welz did not become a famous name in architecture takes us through his brotherâs Nazi-art-dealings, illness, betrayal, emigration, and an uncompromising artistâs vision at the same time sifting through significant, literally-concrete evidence of Welzâs built projects and visionary designs. |
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