JOSEF HOFFMANN
1870–1956
“There are two kinds of artists: those who rationally construct and systematically develop something and the others who are moved by inspiration—I tend to prefer the inspired.”
(Josef Hoffmann, RAVAG-Interview, 1923)
Early years
Josef Hoffmann’s long life spanned more than eight decades of which he spent at least six active as an artist. He lived and worked in five political systems and influenced hundreds of designers to the present day while always remaining true to his high creative standards.
But who was this well-dressed man with a mustache and pince-nez?
Josef Hoffmann was an architect and “all-round designer”—a term he really lived up to. He was an innovator, conscious of tradition, and, as we would maybe call him nowadays, an entrepreneur of his times.
Born as a citizen of the monarchy into a relatively stable “world of yesterday,” Hoffmann spent his youth in Brtnice in today’s Czech Republic. His house of birth, which he later redesigned as a summer residence, has been preserved until today and can be visited as a museum.
At the age of almost ten, his path led him to secondary school in Brno. Hoffmann was traumatized by the authoritarian school system but his interest in art and architecture soon awoke. At the age of 19, after family disputes, he managed to change to the architecture department at the State Technical School where he also passed his school leaving examination.
After one year as an architecture intern in Würzburg, he began his studies at the age of 22 at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. This was the starting point of his new life. Everything would change in this metropolis of the empire—Vienna was a vibrant city that was beginning to replace its weir system and city wall by educational institutions, museums, theaters, and administrative buildings.
Hoffmann’s studies were classically aligned with the high level of excellence required for the Ringstaße project—entirely in the sense of revisiting and implementing historical styles. His professor, Carl Freiherr von Hasenauer, was one of the most important and busiest architects of this boulevard. Two years into Hoffmann’s studies, Hasenauer died and Otto Wagner took over his position.
Professor Otto Wagner
became Hoffmann’s intellectual mentor, he was the great innovator and pioneer in Vienna. With projects like the Stadtbahn, the regulation of the Vienna River, apartment buildings, and, of course, the famous Postal Savings Bank, he rightfully earned the title “Father of Modernity.”
Besides Hoffmann, Wagner’s students and admirers included Adolf Loos, Joseph Maria Olbrich, Max Fabiani, and Rudolph M. Schindler.
Wagner prioritized function, design was to emerge from it. This applied to architecture as well as every object designed by him—following the principle “FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION.”
This principle would also have a lasting impact on Hoffmann, and in many of his objects we can find Wagner’s influence: in design work oriented towards reduction, flat décors, as well as a high level of functionality and simplicity.
JH, table for the living room in Dr. Hermann and Lyda Wittgenstein’s apartment, Wiener Werkstätte, 1905 © MAK/Georg Mayer
JH, table for the living room in Dr. Hermann and Lyda Wittgenstein’s apartment, Wiener Werkstätte, 1905 © MAK/Georg Mayer
JH, table for the living room in Dr. Salzer’s apartment, 1902 © Wolfgang Woessner/MAK
JH, table for the living room in Dr. Salzer’s apartment, 1902 © Wolfgang Woessner/MAK
JH, pepper and paprika box, Wiener Werkstätte, 1903 © MAK/Katrin Wißkirchen
JH, pepper and paprika box, Wiener Werkstätte, 1903 © MAK/Katrin Wißkirchen
JH, centerpiece for Dr. Hermann Wittgenstein, Wiener Werkstätte, 1905 © MAK/Katrin Wißkirchen
JH, centerpiece for Dr. Hermann Wittgenstein, Wiener Werkstätte, 1905 © MAK/Katrin Wißkirchen
JH, samovar owned by Dr. Hermann and Lyda Wittgenstein, Wiener Werkstätte, 1909 © MAK/Katrin Wißkirchen
JH, samovar owned by Dr. Hermann and Lyda Wittgenstein, Wiener Werkstätte, 1909 © MAK/Katrin Wißkirchen
JH, vase, executed by Ludwig Moser & Söhne, Karlovy Vary, for the Wiener Werkstätte, 1923; footed dish, executed by a Bohemian manufactory for the Wiener Werkstätte, 1922 © MAK/Georg Mayer
JH, vase, executed by Ludwig Moser & Söhne, Karlovy Vary, for the Wiener Werkstätte, 1923; footed dish, executed by a Bohemian manufactory for the Wiener Werkstätte, 1922 © MAK/Georg Mayer
JH, wine glass from the series “Patrician,” 1917 © Peter Kainz/MAK
JH, wine glass from the series “Patrician,” 1917 © Peter Kainz/MAK
JH, clock, 1904; flower basket, 1906; plant stand, 1905, all executed by the Wiener Werkstätte © Dr. E. Ploil Collection
JH, clock, 1904; flower basket, 1906; plant stand, 1905, all executed by the Wiener Werkstätte © Dr. E. Ploil Collection
Progress Through Beauty
This is the title of the exhibition at the MAK on show from 15 December 2021 to 19 June 2022.
This telling title was also indicative of Hoffmann’s approach to design—everything was to be BEAUTIFUL to him and the goal of modernity, a new modern human, was always in the focus of the designer.
“Instinctively, we wished to move away from the copying of old styles, firmly determined to develop a form of purpose and beauty.”
(Josef Hoffmann, Autobiography, 1948)
“Hopefully soon here too the time will come that wallpaper, paintings on ceilings, as well as furniture and practical objects are not ordered from retailers but rather from artists.”
This can be read in his essay “Architektonisches von der Insel Capri” [Architectural Matters from the Island of Capri] from 1897. And it was exactly what happened: In 1903, Josef Hoffmann together with his friend the painter Koloman Moser and financier Fritz Waerndorfer founded the Wiener Werkstätte (WW). Waerndorfer’s role in this venture should not be underestimated as he was much more than only a financier. He was manager, agent, advocate of this movement, as well as a client himself.
“…WE WANT TO ENCOURAGE CLOSE CONTACT BETWEEN THE PUBLIC, THE DESIGNERS, AND THE CRAFTSPEOPLE AND PRODUCE GOOD-QUALITY, SIMPLE HOUSEHOLD UTENSILS. WE BEGIN WITH THE PURPOSE, SERVICEABILITY IS OUR FIRST REQUIREMENT. OUR STRENGTH SHOULD LIE IN GOOD CONDITIONS AND GOOD TREATMENT OF MATERIALS. WHERE POSSIBLE, WE WILL AIM TO DECORATE BUT WITHOUT COMPULSION AND NOT AT ANY PRICE…”
(from the work program of the Wiener Werkstätte, 1905)
In the exhibition catalogue Christian Witt-Dörring phrases it as follows:
„The WW represents a sustainable, artisanally produced, identity-forming, local product with individual artistic expression—values that had been invoked by the Arts & Crafts movement in England from the 1850s to counter the negative effects of the Industrial Revolution.“
The Wiener Werkstätte was the key project in Hoffmann’s long life. All of his past and future successes and setbacks were closely linked to the brand Wiener Werkstätte and its influence.
When the Wiener Werkstätte finally had to close down after 29 years, this was also the end of an era that was irretrievably lost despite numerous attempts by Hoffmann to sustain it.
Hoffmann was not only a professor at the School of Arts and Crafts, to which he had been appointed in 1900 to teach the “architecture class” but also an independent architect, entrepreneur, and artistic director of the WW as well as the inventor of cross-genre modern art exhibitions.
As of 1900, this new form was realized in the exhibitions of the Secession as well as the Kunstschau and later also at the Austrian Museum of Art and Industry (AMAI, today’s MAK). For the first time, sculptures and paintings were equal to objects of daily use like textiles, glasses, furniture, and entire interiors.
This formed a wide field of activity that could easily be combined. Hoffmann employed the most talented students from the School of Arts and Crafts and landed numerous commissions for the Wiener Werkstätte from the Viennese bourgeoisie—from flatware to an architectural Gesamtkunstwerk (total work of art).
This fruitful combination of artistic workers and financially strong clients made it possible in the first place to also finance own projects such as the famous Cabaret Fledermaus.
The Gesamtkunstwerk
Josef Hoffmann was influenced by the spirit of the era of the Ringstraße and aspired to infuse all areas of life with good and beautiful art and to merge all sectors of art to one harmonic entity as advocated by the Secessionists. In doing so, he advanced into bourgeoisie areas of life.
Based loosely on Hermann Bahr, Hoffmann’s aspirations are founded on three ideas, which were inspired by the British all-rounder William Morris, the Parisian gallery owner Siegfried Bing, and the Belgian architect Henry van de Velde:
Craftspeople are to become artists, artists are to become craftspeople, and all elements of a room must match harmonically.
Already in 1904, the Wiener Werkstätte received its first commission and was able to implement its great dream of a Gesamtkunstwerk. Based on plans by Josef Hoffmann and commissioned by the Jewish industrialist Victor Zuckerkandl, Sanatorium Westend in Purkersdorf was constructed, a luxurious Kurhaus built around a mineral spring.
Clarity, radical simplicity, and cubic forms are the parameters Hoffmann consequently developed together with Koloman Moser: from the exterior—in collaboration with constructor Eduard Ast—to the interior to the smallest decorative and technical detail of this reinforced concrete construction.
Shortly after, the dream continued. The Belgian industrialist Adolphe Stoclet wanted to build an impressive villa on the Hohe Warte in Vienna’s 19th district. The land had already been bought but family circumstances forced Stoclet to return to Brussels. Therefore, Stoclet House, which has been preserved until today, was not built in Vienna but on Avenue de Tervueren in Brussels.
The Stoclet family’s financial means enabled Hoffmann to plan more elaborately, luxuriously, and exquisitely than elsewhere. Without an agreement by Fritz Waerndorfer to execute construction and furnishing for a lump sum of 500,000 Kronen, not only Hoffmann but the entire Wiener Werkstätte would have got into less difficulties. The costs of the Stoclet House project ended up being three times higher than estimated.
1905–1911, numerous artists of the WW, such as Carl Otto Czeschka, Richard Luksch, and Ludwig Heinrich Jungnickel, as well as Gustav Klimt with his design for the mosaic in the dining room, worked on this “first (and last) modern bourgeois palace,” as phrased by Matthias Boeckl. Here, the unity of the arts—the aim at the time—was given its harmonic manifestation. The garden, the pergola, the porch, as well as the entire outer area were integrated into the Gesamtkunstwerk.
JH, Stoclet House, Brussels © Alan John Ainsworth
JH, Stoclet House, Brussels © Alan John Ainsworth
JH, Stoclet House, living area looking toward the fountain bay, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, Stoclet House, living area looking toward the fountain bay, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, music hall at Stoclet House, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, music hall at Stoclet House, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, dining hall at Stoclet House, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, dining hall at Stoclet House, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, breakfast room at Stoclet House, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, breakfast room at Stoclet House, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, nursery at Stoclet House, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, nursery at Stoclet House, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, master bedroom at Stoclet House, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, master bedroom at Stoclet House, 1914, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen © MAK
JH, Palais Stoclet, model view and garden perspective, before summer 1906 © MAK
JH, Palais Stoclet, model view and garden perspective, before summer 1906 © MAK
As of 1907, a further major project was added. Cabaret Fledermaus on the corner of Kärntner Straße and Johannesgasse was taken on and adapted and furnished following the ideas of the Wiener Werkstätte and its founders.
Here too, everything was dictated: interior, furniture, flatware, dishware, and—to perfect the holistic approach—also the content of the program as well as the culinary program.
In addition to these three outstanding pieces of work, Josef Hoffmann implemented a multitude of “smaller” houses and villas and redecorated numerous apartments.
JH, Skywa-Primavesi villa, Vienna, 1913 © MAK
JH, Skywa-Primavesi villa, Vienna, 1913 © MAK
JH, Primavesi country house in Winkelsdorf/Kouty nad Desnou, Moravia, 1913/14, from the magazine Dekorative Kunst, Munich © MAK
JH, Primavesi country house in Winkelsdorf/Kouty nad Desnou, Moravia, 1913/14, from the magazine Dekorative Kunst, Munich © MAK
JH, Fritz Grohmann’s house, Würbenthal/Vrbno pod Pradêdem (ČSR), 1920/21 © MAK
JH, Fritz Grohmann’s house, Würbenthal/Vrbno pod Pradêdem (ČSR), 1920/21 © MAK
JH, Prof. Pickler’s villa, Budapest, 1909 © MAK
JH, Prof. Pickler’s villa, Budapest, 1909 © MAK
JH, duplex for Moser and Moll on the Hohe Warte, Vienna, 1900/01, from the magazine Der Architekt 1908 © MAK
JH, duplex for Moser and Moll on the Hohe Warte, Vienna, 1900/01, from the magazine Der Architekt 1908 © MAK
JH, Eduard Ast’s country house, Aue near Velden at Lake Wörther, 1923/24 from the magazine Innendekoration, Darmstadt © MAK
JH, Eduard Ast’s country house, Aue near Velden at Lake Wörther, 1923/24 from the magazine Innendekoration, Darmstadt © MAK
JH, duplex for the Kaasgraben villa colony, 1912/13 © MAK
JH, duplex for the Kaasgraben villa colony, 1912/13 © MAK
JH, Dr. Richard Beer-Hofmann’s house, Vienna, 1905/06 © MAK
JH, Dr. Richard Beer-Hofmann’s house, Vienna, 1905/06 © MAK
JH, Ast villa, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen, 1913 © MAK
JH, Ast villa, from the magazine Moderne Bauformen, 1913 © MAK
Invitation to visit the Wiener Werkstätte and Hoffmann houses, 1923 © MAK
Invitation to visit the Wiener Werkstätte and Hoffmann houses, 1923 © MAK
JH, living room in Ing. Brauner’s house, 1905 © MAK
JH, living room in Ing. Brauner’s house, 1905 © MAK
JH, kitchen in Dr. Henneberg’s house, 1900/01, from the magazine Das Interieur, 1903 © MAK
JH, kitchen in Dr. Henneberg’s house, 1900/01, from the magazine Das Interieur, 1903 © MAK
JH, living room in Paul Wittgenstein’s apartment, 1915–1917 © Michael Huey and Christian Witt-Dörring
JH, living room in Paul Wittgenstein’s apartment, 1915–1917 © Michael Huey and Christian Witt-Dörring
JH, seating in the living room of Dr. Johannes and Johanna Salzer’s apartment, 1902, from the magazine Das Interieur 1903 © MAK
JH, seating in the living room of Dr. Johannes and Johanna Salzer’s apartment, 1902, from the magazine Das Interieur 1903 © MAK
JH, dining room in Max Biach’s house, 1902/03, from the magazine Art et Décoration, 1904 © MAK
JH, dining room in Max Biach’s house, 1902/03, from the magazine Art et Décoration, 1904 © MAK
JH, bedroom in Ing. Brauner’s house, 1905 © MAK
JH, bedroom in Ing. Brauner’s house, 1905 © MAK
JH, dining room in Fritz Waerndorfer’s house, 1902 © MAK
JH, dining room in Fritz Waerndorfer’s house, 1902 © MAK
JH, design drawing for the dining room of the Knips villa, 1924/25, from the magazine The Studio, 1929 © MAK
JH, design drawing for the dining room of the Knips villa, 1924/25, from the magazine The Studio, 1929 © MAK
Austrofascism and National Socialism
The war years including their consequences were challenging times and also tarnished the image of the genius who had designed so much for Austria’s cultural heritage. The “fragmentation of the old world” and the reorganization of Europe after World War I also left deep traces in Hoffmann’s life.
In the “Christian Ständestaat [Corporative State]” or Autrofascism under Engelbert Dollfuß, the catholic church became the most important client for artists and architects. Hoffmann, who was Protestant, was only able to profit from this on a limited scale.
The construction of the Austrian pavilion in Venice falls exactly into this period. Although Hoffmann was internationally renowned and won the newly announced competition, he was not aligned enough with the regime for the execution. Consequently, Hoffmann himself didn’t see the building before 1938. After structural damages appeared he was evidently furious and wrote in a letter in 1936:
“From this it can be learned that with such an important building that is in constant competition with other nations, beyond drawing plans the architect must on all accounts be in charge of overseeing construction and contracting the construction company. As in the realization of my plans I was not entrusted with overseeing the construction, and not even with inspecting the building upon completion, I must abdicate any responsibility.”
During National Socialism, the tide seemed to turn for Hoffmann. Even though he rarely spoke up politically, he knew how to navigate the different political conditions. Due to good connections to the Viennese city administration first lucrative projects like the reconfiguration of the German embassy into the Haus der Wehrmacht [House of the Armed Forces] arose.
Hoffmann, however, in many regards underestimated the unscrupulousness of the Nazi regime. In a letter to Carl Otto Czeschka he wrote somewhat naively:
“The WW’s small collection in the municipal gallery was naturally smeared as degenerate, as were our very good modern galleries. All that will of course be set straight once people have had time to have second thoughts.”
Josef Hoffmann used and cultivated his connections in a time of social upheaval. He neither took up the cudgels for old friends nor questioned the new regime. He rather tried to entirely adapt to it to be able to continue working as an artist. Apparently, however, the National Socialists never really trusted Hoffmann and the relationship remained ambivalent.
The Gauakt [gau file] states the following on Hoffmann:
“In a technical regard he is an advocate of modern art and not sympathetic to art of a National Socialist tendency. His artistic outlook is international. He therefore associated a great deal with Jews prior to the changes [i.e., the Anschluss] as he was also a member of the Wiener Werkstätte, which was utterly Judaized. […] He is a Sudeten German, has behaved indifferently in a political regard and only discovered his German heart after the changes.”
And it also seems to have dawned on Hoffmann that not “all we be set straight again.” In 1942, he wrote to his friend Carl Otto Czeschka:
“The tendency in the school is to eradicate and neutralize every memory of our proficiency. My exhibition for my 70th birthday was proscribed and almost banned. […] Nevertheless, I am still alive though I have not a single commission or any big job.”
Later Years
In the time after Austria’s liberation, Hoffmann became a member of the executive and supervisory boards of the Österreichische Werkstätten, a reestablishment of the “Kunsthandwerkverein” that had been strongly influenced by National Socialism. He therefore again possessed a structure of organization that enabled him to continue working the way he was used to.
Furthermore, he again worked for the municipality of Vienna, constructed housing complexes, and planned some unrealized private houses.
In 1950, Hoffmann was awarded the Grand Austrian State Prize as well as some more international tributes and awards. He became commissioner of the Biennale, was the President of the Vienna Secession for some time, and worked for and with manufactories like Augarten Porzellan, Backhausen, and J. & L. Lobmeyr, which all continue to produce his wonderful designs to this day.
In the catalog of the exhibition at the MAK, Rainald Franz ends Hoffmann’s extensive biography as follows:
“He celebrates his 85th birthday in Stoclet House in Brussels and dies shortly after, on 7 May 1956, of a stroke in Vienna. Josef Hoffmann is laid to rest in a grave of honor designed by Fritz Wotruba in Vienna Central Cemetery.”
This was the end of a long life. Far beyond his death, Josef Hoffmann remains an icon of the 20th century. The MAK does not tire of presenting and processing this exceptional artist’s extraordinary ideas, achievements, and accomplishments. In this regard, we are looking forward to your visit!
The concept for this MAK.digiSTORY was created by Gabriele Fabiankowitsch and Thaddäus Stockert. It was implemented with the help of the curators of the exhibition, Christian Witt-Dörring, Matthias Boeckl, and Rainald Franz, as well as Thomas Matyk, MAK Reproduction and Photos Department.
Translated by Christina Anderson
The MAK.digiSTORY is part of the project ATCZ264 – JH Neu digital / JH Nově digitální and was cofinanced by EFRE funds from the European Union (INTERREG V-A Austria – Czech Republic).
For school classes and everybody young at heart, we designed a leaflet on Josef Hoffmann. Simply download, print in A3 format and cross-fold.