The geometric simplicity of Marcel Breuer’s B5 side chair makes it a quintessential example of Bauhaus design. Breuer became interested in tubular metal as a material for furniture after observing its strength and durability on the bicycle that he rode around the Bauhaus, the avant-garde German art school where in the 1920s, he studied and then taught. The B5 chair demonstrates Breuer’s mastery of orthogonal form while preserving subtle visual detail, such as the parallel front stretchers and rhyming handle and seat. Its simple geometries of a cubic base and perpendicular planes of fabric show how Breuer simplified the chair to its barest minimum. This example retains its original Eisengarn fabric, a specially developed, ultra-durable, waxed cotton. It was one of four designs Breuer developed in the mid-1920s from tubular steel, and appeared in the Breuer-furnished dining room of Erwin Piscator, a German theater director and member of the German avant-garde (a related version was designed for the home and atelier of László Moholy-Nagy). The chair was first produced by the Berlin firm Standard-Möbel, which Breuer co-founded (this chair is from that brief period). When that firm was sold to the Thonet company in 1929, production continued and the chair remained in demand for decades.
Bobbye Tigerman, Marilyn B. and Calvin B. Gross Curator, Decorative Arts and Design, 2018
