Her connection with the
Bauhaus is created when she began her studies at the private school of Johannes Itten, in 1916, one of the main figures in the founding of the school created by
Walter Gropius.
Friedl Dicker was one of the first students of the
Bauhaus in Weimar. When the school was inaugurated in 1919, Friedl Dicker, like other students, followed Johannes Itten.
(1) There she studied until 1923. In 1921 she was the only one to receive a scholarship because the Council of Teachers decided that Dicker would be one of the 12 students who would be exempt from paying the academic fees during the semester, remembering the economic difficulties of the moment.
Thanks to her results, she received a letter of recommendation from Johannes Itten, professor at the Bauhaus school:
"Miss F. Dicker was one of my students between 1919 and 1923 in Vienna and at the Bauhaus in Weimar, artistically an extraordinary person whom I hold in my highest esteem educational authorities." (2)
Johannes Itten
One esteem that was reciprocal, as she says in the letter addressed to her friend Hilde Kothny in 1940:
"... she helped me to trace from exhausted forms (...) The things that I learned at that time seem to have been totally absorbed." (3)
Friedl Dicker
During these years she worked in textile design, binding and participated in typography workshops. She designed the costumes and sets for important plays like "The Merchant of Venice" by William Shakespeare. She also designed four variants of an architectural plan, along with Franz Singer (1896-1954), who also belonged to the group of Viennese students from Itten, which were characterized by unconventional developments.
After graduating, Friedl Dicker left the Bauhaus in 1923 and moved to Berlin where with former colleagues, Franz Singer, Naum Slutzky (1894-1965) and Franz Skala (1892-1975), founded the Werkstätten bildender Kunst. At the same time she and Singer continue their work for the theater, in particular for stage director Berthold Viertel (1885-1953). Soon after, in 1924, she moved to Vienna to work in a joint studio with her study partner Anny Wotitz-Moller (1900-1945). From the autumn of 1924 she lived in Bleichenergasse in the 9th district of Vienna. In 1925 she founded a studio with Martha Döberl in the same district, Wasserburggasse, to which Franz Singer (8.2.1896 Vienna - 5.1.1954 Berlin) would move in 1926.
Architecture studio, Singer - Dicker.
The works related to the architecture were realized in the study formed with Franz Singer under the unofficial name of Atelier Singer-Dicker. Among the collaborators of the study were Martha Hauska-Döberl, Anna Szábo or Leopoldine Schrom.
(4)
Tennis club Dr. Hans Heller, Vienna, 1928.
The collaboration with Singer between 1926 and 1931 led to a large number of architectural projects, including new buildings (the most relevant were the Tennis Club in Vienna, the guest pavilion of Countess Heriot and the Montessori kindergarten), but more frequently they would be projects for interior modifications of residential and commercial premises. The firm was characterized by creating a dual architecture that for many is the expression of the identity of its authors. Many of the projects were characterized by a double program in the rooms, as in the Reisner House of 1929.
Dicker-Singer realizes an extension in the housing of the Reisner family, realizing an apartment in the original cover of the building. This new apartment included two multipurpose rooms for the couple Edwin and Else. In each there was a table to eat, a seating area with a desk and library, and finally a sleeping area with a bed. Only one of the beds in these rooms will be of marriage. These kinds of rooms were called "Wohnzimmer". The Reisner house was reduced to two large rooms with a bathroom, a storage room and a kitchen.
That same year it seems that Dicker participated in the exhibition of Stuttgart "Moderne Inneneinrichtungen" (Modern Interior Furnishings).
Guest Pavilion of Countess Heriot. Design by Singer-Dicker. 1932
An exceptionally interesting project was the guest pavilion of Countess Heriot, both formally and technologically. At that time only Germany manufactured curved glass that was used around a circular elevator that articulated from the center all the proposal. A really interesting project, unfortunately also destroyed.
Between 1930 the firm designs the Montessori Kindergarten Goethehof municipal kindergarten, later they would also receive the commision to design the interior furnishing. A project remembered by many as a unique kindergarten, interior designs and exquisite furniture. They designed toys to stimulate the intellectual abilities of children. A group of these prototypes were folding beds, tables and chairs, so that the children could transform a canteen into a bedroom.
Friedl Dicker and her many facets.
In 1931 she was invited by the city of Vienna to give an art course for nursery teachers. Her philosophy as a teacher was not to approach an object or topic superficially, with only the intention to act on the outer layer we see, but rather to seek the essence of the subject to empathize with him. The aim was to transmit all the notions obtained in the school of the Bauhaus that promoted its inner development and its practical relation with art.
After her separation with Singer, in the spring of 1931, (although some of the projected works would be finished between 1932 and 1934), Dicker asks the old masters Gropius and Itten letters of recommendation.
(5) Despite the Gropius' recommendations to the authorities failed to acquire public sector construction contracts.
Friedl Dicker was extremely versatile throughout her life and in various collaborations in the fields of painting, graphics, crafts, stage design, furniture construction and architecture. As a committed member of the circle around the bookshop 'Black Rose' - she was a member of the KPÖ in 1931 - she was arrested for her communist activity, during the 'Starhemberg Putsches', in 1934.
After being released she moved to Prague where she opened her own studio. There he worked for a while with the architect Karola Bloch, also an immigrant. In addition to furniture and accessories, she dedicates time to photography, tapestries and bags. Friedl Dicker married Pavel Brandeis on April 30, 1936.
In 1938 they moved to Hronov, northeast of Prague, where Pavel Brandeis worked as an accountant for Spiegler & Söhne. Friedl designed weaving patterns and an exhibition stand for this textile company, which was delivered at the Nachod trade fair in the same year.
Last years in Terezín
In 1942 Friedl Brandeis was deported to Theresienstadt as a Jewess. Being deported voluntarily to meet her husband, Friedl spent her last days in Terezín, a town in the Czech Republic known for its concentration camp. There she clandestinely gave art classes for the child population that was confined. In this context she focused her life on children and their art. Judging by the drawings made by the children not only absorbed all the teaching of the Bauhaus but knew how to transmit it.
(6)
Before being deported, in 1944, she gave Raja Engläderova two suitcases with between 5,000 and 6,000 drawings made in her classes, which are currently in the Jewish Museum in Prague. On October 6, 1944, she was transferred from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz, and three days later, on October 9, 1944, Friedl Brandeis was murdered in the concentration camp.
(7)
