Nazi architecture
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Nazi architecture was an architectural plan and integral part of the Nazi party's plans to create a cultural and spiritual rebirth in Germany as part of the Third Reich.
Adolf Hitler was an admirer of imperial Rome and aware that some ancient Germans had, over time, become part of the social fabric and exerted influence on the Empire. On the other hand, the Germanic tribes were traditionally regarded by the Romans as enemies of the Pax Romana. Nonetheless, he considered the Romans an early Aryan empire, and emulated their architecture in an original style inspired by both neo-classic and art deco, sometimes known as "severe" deco, erecting edifices as cult sites for the Nazi party. He also ordered construction of a type of Victory Altar, borrowed from the Greeks, who were, according to Nazi theory, inseminated with the seed of the Aryan peoples. At the same time, because of his admiration for the Classical cultures of the ancient Mediterranean, he could not isolate and politicise German antiquity, as Mussolini had done with respect to Roman antiquity. Therefore he had to import political symbols into Germany and justify their presence on the grounds of a spurious racial ancestry, the myth that ancient Greeks were among the ancestors of the Germans - linked to the same Aryan peoples.
See also
- List of Nazi constructions
- Schwerbelastungskörper
- Nazi art
- Totalitarian architecture
- Fascist architecture
- Stalinist architecture
- Reactionary modernism
- Volk
- Völkisch movement