Adolf Franz Karl Viktor Maria Loos (10 December 1870 – 23 August 1933) was an Austrian and Czech architect and influential European theorist of modern architecture.Adolf Loos not only was part of the first wave of modern architecture but also served as an important source of inspiration for all architects who followed. He is emblematic of the turn-of-the-century generation that was torn between the traditional culture of the nineteenth century and the innovative modernism of the twentieth. Loos's masterful “astylistic architecture” is captured in this volume by the esteemed photographer Roberto Schezen in over one hundred exceptional photographs. His essay Ornament and Crime advocated smooth and clear surfaces in contrast to the lavish decorations of the fin de siècle and also to the more modern aesthetic principles of the Vienna Secession, exemplified in his design of Looshaus, Vienna. Loos became a pioneer of modern architecture and contributed a body of theory and criticism of Modernism in architecture and design and developed the "Raumplan" (literally spatial plan) method of arranging interior spaces, exemplified in Villa Müller in Prague.
Loos had three tumultuous marriages that all ended in divorce. He suffered from poor health, including an inherited hearing affliction, and was involved in a pedophilia scandal. He died aged 62 on 23 August 1933 in Kalksburg near Vienna.
Early life
Loos was born on 10 December 1870 in Brno, in the Margraviate of Moravia region of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, today the eastern part of the Czech Republic. His father, a German stonemason, died when Loos was nine years old. Young Adolf Loos had inherited his father's hearing impairment and was significantly handicapped by it throughout his life. His mother continued to carry on the stonemason business after her husband's death. Loos attended several Gymnasium schools, a technical school in Liberec and graduated 1889 from a technical school in Brno. He later studied at Dresden University of Technology. He left one year later without completing his study.
Career
Starting with the refurbishment of his own apartment in 1903, twenty of Loos's most significant buildings are beautifully displayed: Villa Karma, the Kärntner Bar, the Goldman & Salatsch Michaelerplatz Building, the Zentralsparkasse Bank, and the Steiner, Scheu, Moller, and Müller houses. Schezen's vivid color and luminous black-and-white photographs display each building in detail, showing both the formal characteristics and the rich textures and materials Loos most frequently used.
At age 23, Loos traveled to the United States and stayed there for three years from 1893–96. While in the United States, he mainly lived with relatives in the Philadelphia area, supported himself with odd jobs and also visited other cities such as the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, St. Louis and New York. Loos returned to Vienna in 1896 and made it his permanent residence. He was a prominent figure in the city and a friend of Ludwig Wittgenstein, Arnold Schönberg, Peter Altenberg and Karl Kraus.
Inspired by his years in the New World he devoted himself to architecture. After briefly associating himself with the Vienna Secession in 1896, he rejected the style and advocated a new, plain, unadorned architecture. A utilitarian approach to use the entire floor plan completed his concept. Loos's early commissions consisted of interior designs for shops and cafés in Vienna.
Architectural theory
Complementing this remarkable visual material is Kenneth Frampton's perceptive essay, which places Loos within the context of Viennese intellectuals of the time. His circle, which included Arnold Schönberg, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and at the center, Karl Kraus, explored the essential nature of architecture, and the other arts and sciences, through linguistic structures. Frampton identifies the hallmarks that Loos derived from these structures and with which he created his work: the blank, “degree-zero” exterior with its luxurious interior; his commentary on architecture's position between art and function, plus subtle recollections of both the classic and the vernacular. All these ploys were to subvert typical architectural expectations. Joseph Rosa's accompanying descriptions comprehensively discuss each building, from the circumstances surrounding the realization of the projects to the use of Loos's architectural conventions.
Loos authored several polemical works. In Spoken into the Void, published in 1900, he attacked the Vienna Secession, at a time when the movement was at its height.
In his essays, Loos used provocative catchphrases and is noted for the essay/manifesto entitled Ornament and Crime, given in a lecture in 1910 and first published in 1913. He explored the idea that the progress of culture is associated with the deletion of ornament from everyday objects, and that it was therefore a crime to force craftsmen or builders to waste their time on ornamentation that served to hasten the time when an object would become obsolete (design theory). Loos' stripped-down buildings influenced the minimal massing of modern architecture, and stirred controversy. Although noted for the lack of ornamentation on their exteriors, the interiors of many of Loos’s buildings are finished with rich and expensive materials, notably stone, marble and wood, displaying natural patterns and textures in flat planes, executed in first rate craftsmanship. The distinction is not between complicated and simple, but between "organic" and superfluous decoration.
Loos was also interested in the decorative arts, collecting sterling silver and high quality leather goods, which he noted for their plain yet luxurious appeal. He also enjoyed fashion and men's clothing, designing the famed Kníže of Vienna, a haberdashery. His admiration for the fashion and culture of England and America can be seen in his short-lived publication Das Andere, which ran for just two issues in 1903 and included advertisements for 'English' clothing. In 1920, he had a brief collaboration with Frederick John Kiesler - architect, theater and art-exhibition designer.
Loos House and other projects
From 1904 on, he was able to carry out big projects; the most notable the so-called "Loos House" (built from 1910–12), originally the Viennese tailor Goldman and Salatsch, for whom Loos had designed a store interior in 1898, and situated right across from the Habsburg city residence Hofburg Palace. The house, today Michaelerplatz 3, Vienna, and under monument preservation, was criticized by its contemporaries. The facade was dominated by rectilinear window patterns and a lack of stucco decoration and awnings, which earned it the nickname "House without Eyebrows"; Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria was said to have despised the modern building so much that he avoided leaving the Hofburg Palace through a main gate in its vicinity. His work also includes the store of the men's fashion house Knize (built 1909–13), Am Graben 13, Café Museum (built 1899), Operngasse 7, Vienna, and the "American Bar" (built 1907–08), Kärntnerstrasse 10, Vienna..
Loos visited the island of Skyros in 1904 and was influenced by the cubic architecture of the Greek islands. When the Austro-Hungarian Empire collapsed after World War I Loos was awarded Czechoslovakian citizenship by President Masaryk. His main place of residence remained in Vienna. During the First Austrian Republic Loos became interested in public projects. He designed several housing projects for the City of Vienna (Red Vienna). From 1924–28 Loos lived in Paris. He taught at the Sorbonne and was contracted to build a house for Tristan Tzara, which was completed 1925 in Avenue Junot 15, Paris. In 1928 he returned to Vienna.
Loos had an admiration for classical architecture, which is reflected in his writings and his entry to the 1922 Chicago Tribune competition. Loos' submission was a massive doric column.
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