Navigating Problematic Bauhaus Inheritances: Critiques, Implications, and Questions from the Bauhaus of the Seas NEB Lighthouse

Abstract

In 2020, Europe announced the New European Bauhaus (NEB). While the initiative intends to achieve EU sustainability goals, framing it under the name of the Bauhaus brings various challenges and issues to the fore. In this article, we analyze the critiques of the original Bauhaus and the NEB to understand the challenges that the NEB lighthouse project Bauhaus of the Seas Sails (BoSS) inherits by adhering to the Bauhaus vision and name. We unveil the problematic dynamics of Eurocentric modernity's myths of universalism and better living through technology and on the Bauhaus's and NEB's position in global power structures. Instead of assuming a tabula rasa approach and replicating problematic structures unknowingly, we bring these three aspects to BoSS to find questions as orientation points to help steer away from problematic aspects inherited by reanimating the Bauhaus name and its legacy.