The World of Forms

In 1922, the naturalist and Nobel prize-winning physicist Wilhelm Ostwald published his morphology The Harmony of Forms . Until 1928, four portfolios followed this publication under the title The World of Forms , in which Ostwald extended his doctrine to a form of explicit programming. The 240 series of shapes printed on transparent sheets can be freely combined. Ostwald s formal doctrine influenced not only the Werkbund, but also the Bauhaus and the Dutch art movement De Stijl. Even though his theory of shapes was enthusiastically adapted by Moholy-Nagy, as well as later in the concrete art of Max Bill, Karl Gerstner and especially Hans Hinterreiter, among many others, it has been largely forgotten today in contrast to Wilhelm Ostwald s color theory. The publication unites and comments the works between the poles of ornament and art, system and construction, and scientific and artistic determinations of form.