Object description:
Erich Mendelsohn is one of the most prominent architects of Modernism. He studied at the Technische Hochschule in Berlin and by the late 1920s his Berlin office was one of the largest and most successful in Europe. His early work - expressive, dynamic, and sculptural - is exemplified by the famous Einstein Tower observatory in Potsdam (1920-24). Among his clients was the publisher and businessman Salman Schocken, for whom Mendelsohn designed three large department stores. In 1933, with the rise of the Nazis to power, the architect left Germany and opened an office in London and, in 1935, a branch office in Jerusalem. He lived in Jerusalem from 1939 to 1941 and then settled in the United States.
Among his important Jerusalem projects are Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus, the Anglo-Palestine Bank, and the Schocken House and nearby Library. The Schocken House demonstrates Mendelsohn's shift in the 1930s toward a more functional, restrained architecture, yet the drawing, showing an early stage of the design in bold and expressive lines, still echoes his early style. Taking local considerations into account, he used narrow windows to keep out the hot sun and stone walls in conformity with the building code introduced by the British. The building was later acquired by the Rubin Academy of Music; unfortunately subsequent additions and alterations changed the original design completely. This sketch is one of nine previously known drawings from the estate of Uriel Kahana, an architect who worked in Mendelsohn's, Jerusalem office.
