Nomina sunt Omina-Capital City Bonn: Inventing an image for the Federal republic of Germany

Barnstone, DA

Nomina sunt Omina-Capital City Bonn: Inventing an image for the Federal republic of Germany

Barnstone, DA

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Publication Type:: Journal Article
Citation:: Journal of Design History, 2014, 27 (2), pp. 148 - 166
Issue Date:: 2014-01-01

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Field	Value	Language
dc.contributor.author	Barnstone, DA https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2846-1226	en_US
dc.date.issued	2014-01-01	en_US
dc.identifier.citation	Journal of Design History, 2014, 27 (2), pp. 148 - 166	en_US
dc.identifier.issn	0952-4649	en_US
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/10453/41859
dc.description.abstract	Bonn's ascension to the rank of capital city in 1948/1949 represented the first major success of a new political culture and the original aesthetic imperatives it was designing. In 1948 five cities, Berlin, Bonn, Frankfurt, Kassel and Stuttgart, vied to be chosen capital city of the soon to be formed Federal Republic of Germany. When the dust settled, the unexpected had occurred; the sleepy university town in the Western reaches of the country, Bonn, had triumphed over a cultural centre, financial centre, commercial centre, and the former capital city. The new political aesthetics were firstly based on the repudiation of any aesthetic program associated with either National Socialism or Monarchism, Third Reich or Wilhelmine Germany. Carlo Schmid warned that nomina sunt omina-names are omens! 'Names express what is really there, or ought to be there', that is, the essence of things. Although Schmid was warning about the name of the future constitution, his attitude reflected a broadly held belief that names and symbols are important, even crucial signifiers. This paper explores the ways the choice of Bonn was perceived by West Germans in their visual media through a look at several political cartoons and how the cartoons and official state press photographs from the Bundesarchiv collection contributed to the formation of Bonn's symbolic identity. © 2014 The Author.	en_US
dc.relation.ispartof	Journal of Design History	en_US
dc.relation.isbasedon	10.1093/jdh/epu012	en_US
dc.subject.classification	History	en_US
dc.title	Nomina sunt Omina-Capital City Bonn: Inventing an image for the Federal republic of Germany	en_US
dc.type	Journal Article
utslib.citation.volume	2	en_US
utslib.citation.volume	27	en_US
utslib.for	120103 Architectural History and Theory	en_US
utslib.for	1203 Design Practice and Management	en_US
pubs.embargo.period	Not known	en_US
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/Faculty of Design, Architecture and Building
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/Faculty of Design, Architecture and Building/School of Architecture
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/Strength - CCDP - Contemporary Design Practice
utslib.copyright.status	open_access
pubs.issue	2	en_US
pubs.publication-status	Published	en_US
pubs.volume	27	en_US

Abstract:

Bonn's ascension to the rank of capital city in 1948/1949 represented the first major success of a new political culture and the original aesthetic imperatives it was designing. In 1948 five cities, Berlin, Bonn, Frankfurt, Kassel and Stuttgart, vied to be chosen capital city of the soon to be formed Federal Republic of Germany. When the dust settled, the unexpected had occurred; the sleepy university town in the Western reaches of the country, Bonn, had triumphed over a cultural centre, financial centre, commercial centre, and the former capital city. The new political aesthetics were firstly based on the repudiation of any aesthetic program associated with either National Socialism or Monarchism, Third Reich or Wilhelmine Germany. Carlo Schmid warned that nomina sunt omina-names are omens! 'Names express what is really there, or ought to be there', that is, the essence of things. Although Schmid was warning about the name of the future constitution, his attitude reflected a broadly held belief that names and symbols are important, even crucial signifiers. This paper explores the ways the choice of Bonn was perceived by West Germans in their visual media through a look at several political cartoons and how the cartoons and official state press photographs from the Bundesarchiv collection contributed to the formation of Bonn's symbolic identity. © 2014 The Author.

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http://hdl.handle.net/10453/41859