Schwitters was an innovator in many art forms, but it is perhaps through his architectural scale installations, the Merzbauten (Merz Buildings), that he exerted his greatest influence on modern art and architecture.
The Hannover Merzbau (1923 – 33)
The Haus am Bakken at Lysaker near Oslo (1937 - 40)
The Schwittershytta on the island of Hjertoya (1934 - 39)
The Elterwater Merz Barn (1947)
The first of these, constructed over a period of many years in his parents’ house in Hanover, was destroyed during the bombing of the city. A reconstruction of the main room can be found in the Sprengel Museum in Hannover. Schwitters began work on two more Merzbau installations in Norway, but again, very little evidence remains of them now. Schwitters’ last Merzbau was built during the final years of his life, in a shed near Elterwater, and although unfinished at the time of the artist’s death in 1948 is now regarded as one of the great pioneering works of modern art and architecture.
During his lifetime Schwitters worked on four Merzbautens: the Hannover Merzbau (1923 - 36); two Merzbauten in Norway: the Haus am Bakken at Lysaker near Oslo (1937 - 40 ), and the Schwittershytta on the island of Hjertoya (1934 - 39); and finally the The Elterwater Merz Barn, Great Langdale, Cumbria (1947), on which the artist was still working shortly before he died in January 1948.
The Hannover Merzbau is the most widely known and best documented of all of these, although it was destroyed by a stray bomb in 1943. A reconstruction of the main rom was made in 1983 by the Swiss designer Peter Bissegger working from photographs of the original and with advice from Schwitters’ son Ernst. This installation is now on permanent display at the Sprengel Museum in Hannover.
Unfortunately relatively little remains of any of the other Merzbau structures. The Lysaker Merzbau burned to the ground in 1950, and the two remaining Merzbauten, the Schwittershytta in Norway and the Merz Barn in England, exist as degraded structures, with key fragments of the Merz art works they contained having been lost or dispersed for exhibition elsewhere.
The Hannover Merzbau (1923 - 36) “A new domain in art..”
The Norwegian Merzbauten (1937 - 40)
The Elterwater Merz Barn, Great Langdale, Cumbria (1947)
Spadeadam, UNITED KINGDOM