fter their seizure of power on January 31, 1933, the Nazis began reshaping the nation’s culture and educational systems. The Berlin Bauhaus closed on April 11, 1933. Most of its teachers submitted letters of protest but they had no effect.

89

Book Burning in Berlin, Opernplatz, 1933

Even after the school closed Gropius remained a constant presence at conferences, recounting the Bauhaus saga. He stayed intent on liberating the Bauhaus from narrow geographic and temporal limitations. At the same time he praised the avant-garde ideas pursued by the Bauhaus faculty in Weimar, seeing them as part of the historical continuum. He considered the school to be a model of education with universal implications. He may not have been far from the truth.