About the project
The joint research project launched in September 2017 by Fachhochschule Dortmund (Prof. Dr. Renate Kastorff-Viehmann), Dortmund University of Technology (Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Sonne) and Philipps-Universität Marburg (Prof. Dr. Jörg Stabenow) is funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG).
The architect Peter Grund can be seen as an exemplary figure in two respects: On the one hand, he embodies in a special way an architectural direction that helped shape architectural events in Germany during the first half of the 20th century with remarkable continuity across three political systems. As a successful practitioner, Grund usually accompanied the formative debates of the time from the second row and can therefore be considered a typical representative of a versatile architectural movement that was effective beyond political caesuras in Germany. On the other hand, the research project on Peter Grund offers the rare case of an extensive architectural estate documenting all creative phases, which is not often preserved below the level of the 'great masters'.
Research into Grund's work thus provides the opportunity to gain fundamental insights into the 'longue durée' in architecture and urban planning in the first half of the 20th century, over and above the individual case, which is already meaningful in itself. The overarching interest of the project is directed towards these lines of continuity.
As an architect and urban planner, Peter Grund represents formative phases of German history and culture in three locations. Born in Pfungstadt near Darmstadt, he found his first field of activity in the expanding Ruhr metropolis of Dortmund from 1923. In an office partnership with Karl Pinno, who lived there, he became an exceptionally successful competition architect around 1930. A second stage of his work began in 1934, when he was appointed director of the Düsseldorf Art Academy as part of the National Socialist 'Gleichschaltung'. From this position, he acted as artistic director of the 'Schaffendes Volk' exhibition in 1937. His third area of activity became Darmstadt, where he took over the office of senior building director in 1947 - after a quick denazification - and was responsible for the reconstruction and redesign of the city center until 1959.
The basis of the research project is the scientific indexing of the estate, which is spread over two locations (Darmstadt City Archives and Fachhochschule Dortmund). In cooperation with the Darmstadt City Archive and the Archive for Architecture and Civil Engineering NRW at TU Dortmund University (A:AI, from 2018 Baukunstarchiv NRW), the two collections will be digitized and thus brought together virtually.
Building on this, the research interest is primarily focused on three questions: the networks and institutional structures in which Grund operated (Kastorff-Viehmann part of the project); Grund's design work in the context of the dominant trends in German architecture in the 1920s to 1960s (Stabenow part of the project); the systematic analysis of his urban design work and the associated intentions and theoretical justifications (Sonne part of the project). In the synthesis of the three areas of investigation, the architect's work process becomes the subject of a case study, with the help of which overarching processes and problem areas can be illuminated more clearly.
Cooperation partners
Stadtarchiv Darmstadt (Dr. Peter Engels)
Archive for Architecture and Civil Engineering NRW of the TU Dortmund (Dipl.-Ing. Regina Wittmann)
Architecture Museum of the Technical University of Munich (Dr. Anja Schmidt)
Project management
Prof. Dr. Renate Kastorff-Viehmann (Fachhochschule Dortmund)
Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Sonne (Dortmund University of Technology)
Prof. Dr. Jörg Stabenow (Philipps University Marburg)
Editing
Dipl.-Ing. Stephan Gudewer (Fachhochschule Dortmund)
Christian Klusemann M.A. (Philipps University Marburg)
Ute Reuschenberg M.A. (Dortmund University of Technology)
Dipl.-Ing. Dagmar Spielmann-Deisenroth (Dortmund University of Technology)