National Houses – Damnatio Memorie? Architecture and Nationalism at the end of 19th and in 20th Century

Authors

GALETA Jan

Year of publication 2015
Type Article in Proceedings
Conference Admired As Well As Overlooked Beauty. Contributions to Architecture of Historicism, Art Nouveau, Early Modernism and Traditionalism
MU Faculty or unit

Faculty of Arts

Citation
Field Art, architecture, cultural heritage
Keywords National Houses; History of Architecture; Historicism; German National House; Deutsches Haus; Czech National House
Description This paper is focused on so called National Houses from the end of 19th and begining of the 20th century. This type of building is special kinds of clubhouse defined by large accumulation of diverse functions and also by use of specific architectonical style or decoration, which clearly demonstrate nationality of the owners to the public. The Austro-Hungarian Empire, mainly Cisleithania was the place with ideal conditions and National House is mainly Austro-Hungarian building type. But this contribution is not focused on National Houses as such, but on their second life and on their damnation. 19th century was nationally charged times, but 20th century overcome it strongly. Frictions and rivalry were replaced by hate and humiliation and so the destinies of National Houses in new Europe were unhappy. First it was the German Nazis and Italian fascist who wanted to destroy symbols of hostile nations, then Communists did they part. So this paper will show how some nationally orientated 19th century architecture was treated in 20th century and how its memory was damned.
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