“Chronology is important here” (208). The emphatic, short introduction to Ludwig Mies van der Rohe’s 1933 Reichsbank competition entry in Dietrich Neumann’s new book encapsulates the author’s impartial approach to one of the twentieth century’s most inscrutable giants during one of his most inscrutable periods. Mies wavered in the flurry of politically shifting winds, and history never clarified his reasoning. He was an architectural opportunist, and his work continues to hold fascination because he never satisfied the public’s craving to understand him. When he spoke, it was always with a narrative sheen of sober-minded logic, but (as with Andy Warhol) his best works added up to more than what he said about them. This vacuum of meaning, which hints at a larger secret to unravel, has made Mies a perennial fascination after many of his contemporaries have receded into the fog of history.
The architect endured much praise and criticism...
University of California Press