Carl Christian Krayl (17 April 1890 – 1 April 1947) was a German

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

and artist of the early twentieth century, who was associated with several of the leading

avant-garde In the arts and literature, the term ''avant-garde'' ( meaning or ) identifies an experimental genre or work of art, and the artist who created it, which usually is aesthetically innovative, whilst initially being ideologically unacceptable ...

art movements of

German Expressionism Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it radi ...

. Krayl was born in

Weinsberg Weinsberg (South Franconian: ''Weischberg'') is a town in the north of the state of Baden-Württemberg in Germany. It was founded around 1200 and is situated in the Heilbronn district. The town has about 13,000 inhabitants. It is noted for its win ...

, and educated at the school of applied arts and the technical college of

Stuttgart Stuttgart (; ; Swabian German, Swabian: ; Alemannic German, Alemannic: ; Italian language, Italian: ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, largest city of the States of Germany, German state of ...

. He began his career working for architects in

Nuremberg Nuremberg (, ; ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the Franconia#Towns and cities, largest city in Franconia, the List of cities in Bavaria by population, second-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Bav ...

and

Freiburg Freiburg im Breisgau or simply Freiburg is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, fourth-largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg after Stuttgart, Mannheim and Karlsruhe. Its built-up area has a population of abou ...

. He did technical work in

Ingolstadt Ingolstadt (; Austro-Bavarian language, Austro-Bavarian: ) is an Independent city#Germany, independent city on the Danube, in Upper Bavaria, with 142,308 inhabitants (as of 31 December 2023). Around half a million people live in the metropolitan ...

during

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

. In the years immediately after the War, Krayl was involved with the Arbeitsrat für Kunst, the November Group, the

Glass Chain The Glass Chain or Crystal Chain sometimes known as the "Utopian Correspondence" () was a chain letter that took place between November 1919 and December 1920. It was a correspondence of architects that formed a basis of expressionist architecture i ...

, and

Der Ring Der Ring was an architectural collective founded in 1926 in Berlin. It emerged from expressionist architecture with a functionalist agenda. Der Ring was a group of young architects, formed with the objective of promoting Modernist architecture. ...

, along with

Walter Gropius Walter Adolph Georg Gropius (; 18 May 1883 – 5 July 1969) was a German-born American architect and founder of the Bauhaus, Bauhaus School, who is widely regarded as one of the pioneering masters of modernist architecture. He was a founder of ...

Bruno Taut Bruno Julius Florian Taut (4 May 1880 – 24 December 1938) was a renowned German architect, urban planner and author. He was active during the Weimar period and is known for his theoretical works as well as his building designs. Early l ...

, and other members of the Expressionist movement. Krayl's paintings and drawings from this period are richly imaginative and visionary, with titles like "Cosmic building," "Dream city," and "Light greetings from my star house." Krayl was one of the architects interested in the possibilities of the "glass architecture" advocated by the writer

Paul Scheerbart Paul Karl Wilhelm Scheerbart (8 January 1863, Danzig – 15 October 1915, Berlin) was a German author of speculative fiction literature and drawings. He was also published under the pseudonym ''Kuno Küfer'' and is best known for the book ' ...

. In 1920 Krayl began designing "suspended and swinging architecture," a feature of Scheerbart's 1914 novel '' The Gray Cloth''. Krayl designed a "Crystaline Star House" that hung from the side of a cliff. Krayl also wrote a series of articles that were published in Taut's journal ''Frühlicht'' ("Daybreak"). Simultaneously, Krayl worked in the practical and pragmatic side of architecture. He held a position on the board of works for the city of

Magdeburg Magdeburg (; ) is the Capital city, capital of the Germany, German States of Germany, state Saxony-Anhalt. The city is on the Elbe river. Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor, Otto I, the first Holy Roman Emperor and founder of the Archbishopric of Mag ...

from 1921 to 1938. He designed buildings that were constructed in Magdeburg and elsewhere, including the health insurance building in Magdeburg, a union office, and apartment buildings. In the 1921–1924 years, Krayl was Bruno Taut's assistant while Taut was the city architect in Magdeburg; together they executed a program of facade painting to alleviate the grimness of urban architecture. (The Constructivist artist

Ilya Ehrenburg Ilya Grigoryevich Ehrenburg (, ; – August 31, 1967) was a Soviet writer, revolutionary, journalist and historian. Ehrenburg was among the most prolific and notable authors of the Soviet Union; he published around one hundred titles. He becam ...

saw their work in 1922, and criticized it for "its disproportion and dadaistic hysteria.") In 1933, when the

Nazi regime Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a totalitarian dictat ...

came to power, Krayl was accused of being a

Bolshevik The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

(a false charge). As a result, he was unemployed as an architect through 1937. From 1938 to 1946 he worked as a draftsman for the national railway. He died in

Werder (Havel) Werder (Havel) (; official name derived from ''Werder an der Havel'' ("Werder upon Havel"), colloquially just ''Werder'') is a town in the state of Brandenburg, Germany, located on the Havel river in the Potsdam-Mittelmark district, west of the st ...

in 1947. "We want to look into the distant future and show what is to come...." — Carl Krayl to Walter Gropius, 1919.Valerie J. Fletcher, ''Dreams and Nightmares: Utopian Vision in Modern Art'', Washington, DC, Smithsonian Institution Press, 1983; p. 23.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Krayl, Carl 1890 births 1947 deaths 20th-century German architects Expressionist architects 20th-century German painters 20th-century German male artists German male painters Painters from Baden-Württemberg