Josef Hoffmann

Design of the annual exhibitions in the Josef Hoffmann Museum

The Josef Hoffmann Museum in Brtnice, Czech Republic, the artist's birthplace, is run by the Moravian Gallery in Brno and the MAK as a joint branch. The baroque town house was redesigned by Hoffmann himself in 1910/1911 in the spirit of Viennese Modernism. Itai Margula has been responsible for the design of the annual exhibitions since 2014.

2014/2015: "Collegiality and Controversy. Josef Hoffmann and the architects of Moravian Modernism from the Wagner School in Vienna".

"Collegiality and Controversy" was the exhibition on the life and work of Josef Hoffmann (1870-1956) at the Josef Hoffmann Museum, Brtnice, and contrasted Hoffmann's œuvre with that of two other Wagner students. Like Hoffmann, Joseph Maria Olbrich (1867-1908) and Leopold Bauer (1872-1938) belonged to a generation of talented architects from the Moravian provinces who had a decisive influence on architecture in Vienna around 1900. A targeted selection of approximately 50 drawings, photos and texts outlines their role in the architecture of the imperial capital in Vienna around 1900 and addresses Hoffmann's contribution to architectural renewal in Moravia.

2015/2016: "The Private Josef Hoffmann. Housing Wanderings"

The exhibition "The Private Josef Hoffmann. Flat Walks" at the Josef Hoffmann Museum offered the opportunity to embark on a flat walk in the spirit of Adolf Loos through Josef Hoffmann's residential ensembles. Never-before-seen objects from Josef Hoffmann's private collection, which were inspiration, household items and collector's items, were brought together with contemporary photographic documents that Hoffmann ordered and staged or casually took himself as souvenir photos.

2016/2017: "Josef Hoffmann - Josef Frank. From the 'infinite set' to the open system".

This year, the Josef Hoffmann Museum in Brtnice was dedicated to the relationship between Josef Hoffmann and Josef Frank. Thematically, "Josef Hoffmann - Josef Frank" followed on from the monographic exhibition "Josef Frank: Against Design" at the MAK in Vienna. For the first time, Frank's works were presented in the Czech Republic, which, through their free and individual, open system of design, contrasted with Hoffmann's idea of the overall design of an interior - his garniture thinking.

2017/2018: "Josef Hoffmann - Otto Wagner. On the Use and Effect of Architecture"

"Of the Use and Effect of Architecture" at the Josef Hoffmann Museum in Brtnice was dedicated to Josef Hoffmann's (1870-1956) relationship with his teacher Otto Wagner (1841-1918), whose death anniversary in 2018 was the centenary. The training with Otto Wagner in the special school for architecture at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts, the joint work in Wagner's studio and in the Secession, and Wagner's promotion to professor at the Imperial and Royal School of Arts and Crafts were decisive for Hoffmann's career. Kunstgewerbeschule were decisive.

CURATOR Rainald Franz
ASSISTANG CURATOR Margula Architects
TEAM Itai Margula, Jane Zandonai, Alex Schertler
LOCATION Josef Hoffmann Museum
FOTO Andrea Bratru Velnerova