ABSTRACT

Fiercely iterative window matrices like the Reichsbank's became a hallmark of early Nazi screens, shown even in a case as distant from Berlin as the district court on Victory Square in Konigsberg. Upon reaching power, the Nazis quickly explored both major strains – columnar and cellular – in sizable works in Munich, where the regime originated. Berlin received attention. There would be no more prestige screens realized on the scale of Munich's House of German Art or Berlin's Reichsbank. In aggregate the Fehrbelliner platz area represents Germany's most substantive aggregation of screens and screen-like structures. The Nazi era saw additional, less heroic screens realized in Berlin. Two medium-scaled villa-like projects experiment with the mode outside the context of huge urban or representational commissions. An important competition to build a sizable extension to the Reichsbank's complex in Berlin was undertaken just prior to Hitler's ascension.