Villa Aurora

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Villa Aurora

Villa Aurora is the former home of the German-Jewish author Lion Feuchtwanger and his wife Marta. The Feuchtwangers bought this Spanish-style mansion in 1943 for only $9,000, the annual salary of a school teacher. The house was a popular meeting place for artists and the community of German-speaking émigrés. Lion Feuchtwanger wrote six of his historical novels in this house: Der Tag wird kommen, Waffen für Amerika, Die Jüdin von Toledo, Narrenweisheit oder Tod und Verklärung des Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Jefta und seine Töchter and Goya oder der arge Weg der Erkenntnis. Villa Aurora is located in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles and has been used as an artists residence since 1995.

Villa Aurora was part of a building project initiated by Arthur Weber and George Ley in cooperation with the Los Angeles Times, which reported routinely on the construction of this "demonstration house". Weber hired architect Mark Daniels and interior designer Rodney Benso. The house pipe organ was built by Santa Monica Artcraft.[1] Villa Aurora was inspired by the Teruel Cathedral outside Sevilla, Spain. The wood for the ceilings was brought in from Spain and the fountains came from Italy. The Malibu Tile Company supplied the decorative tiles throughout the entire house. When Villa Aurora was finished in 1928, it featured the latest technological inventions and novelties in domestic design such as an electric garage openers, a dishwasher, a frisge and a gas range. Due to the depression it was not sold and the developer Weber and his family were forced to move in themselves in 1931. Financial problems forced Weber to leave the house in 1939 and the property sat idle.

Villa Aurora and the Feuchtwangers

In 1941, Lion Feuchtwanger and his wife Marta arrived in Los Angeles via New York and Mexico after having escaped from the South of France. Despite the fact that the Villa was in deplorable condition (with windows broken, the cellar full of debris, the garden overgrown) they bought the house in 1943 for the price of $9,000, which at the time equalled the annual salary of a High School teacher. They appreciated the location all the more as the landscape of Pacific Palisades reminded them of the Mediterranean where they had travelled extensively during the early days of their marriage. With gasoline rationing in effect, travel between Pacific Palisades and Los Angeles was difficult, making purchase of outlying real estate unappealing for most. But Lion Feuchtwanger liked this solitude for his work, and the decision to purchase the house came easily. Here, Feuchtwanger created his third library. Marta bought the furniture as second hand and she took care of the garden. While Lion used to buy books whenever there was money to spend, Marta bought plants and created a huge garden, which was over time dimished in size through some landslides. The Feuchtwanger house became a meeting place of fellow émigrés such as Thomas Mann, Arnold Schoenberg, Vicki Baum, Bruno Frank, Ludwig Marcuse, Franz Werfel and Bertolt Brecht as well as the Feuchtwangers’ American friends like Charlie Chaplin and Charles Laughton. Thomas Mann called Villa Aurora a “true castle by the sea”.

After Lions death in 1958, the house was left to the University of Southern California with the stipulation that Marta would be allowed to stay for the remainder of her life and was made the caretaker of the library, which had grown to 30,000 volumes. Today, the Villa still houses 22,000 books, whereas the most valuable copies moved to the USC Feuchtwanger Memorial Library.[2]

Villa Aurora as an artists residence

Marta Feuchtwanger lived at Villa Aurora until her death in 1987. After Marta’s death University of Southern California was looking to sell the property. The sale of the dilapidated Villa seemed imminent and USC professor Harold von Hofe asked the journalist and Feuchtwanger biographer Volker Skierka to launch an initiative to save the Villa Aurora. He also won the support of many public figures in politics and the media, such as the former head of the publishing house Rowohlt, Fritz J. Raddatz, and member of the German parliament Freimut Duve. The goal was to create a “Villa Massimo on the Pacific” modeled after the artists residency Villa Massimo in Rome. In order to preserve the house as the only existing monument to European and German exiles to the West Coast of the United States, the association „Friends and Supporters of Villa Aurora“ was founded in Berlin. The non-profit organization secured public funding from the German Federal Foreign Office, the Berlin Senate, the Berlin Lottery Foundation and the Tagesspiegel Foundation and was able to purchase and renovate the house. Prof. Frank Dimster, FAIA, restored the house and received the City of Los Angeles Historic Preservation Award in 1996.[3] The Feuchtwanger House was landmarked by one of the Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monuments and also by the Pacific Palisades Historical Society. The historic organ, that in addition to Marta Feuchtwanger, Bruno Walter, Ernst Toch and Hanns Eisler had played on, was restored in 2010. The historic furniture, including the beds of Marta and Lion, and their desks and chairs, are still on the premise.

Today, Villa Aurora is an artists residence offering fellowships for German-based writers, visual artists, composers and filmmakers selected by independent committees. Together with the USC Feuchtwanger Memorial Library, the organization awards an annual Feuchtwanger Fellowship to artists who are persecuted in their home countries in memory of the history of German emigration in the 1930s.

Villa Aurora is funded by the German Federal Foreign Office and the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media. Sponsors and private donations further help to maintain the historic property. The Villa stands as a reminder of German exile in the United States and is a memorial to German-Exile-Culture and the persecution of the German Jews. Villa Aurora is a place for cultural encounters, creative debates and joint projects. Since 1995 around 300 artists have enlivened this place and have themselves been inspired by U.S. culture and the exiles’ traces. The Villa Aurora Forum in Berlin organizes the meetings of the selection committees which choose the fellows of Villa Aurora. The Forum also presents the results of the artists’ works to the German public through exhibitions, screenings, readings, concerts and the publishing of editions. At the annual ‘Villa Aurora Nacht’ in Berlin, the newly chosen fellows are presented along with the work of the ones from the previous year.

The name "Villa Aurora"

The origin of the name "Villa Aurora" is not clear. One assumes that it was used to emphasize the Mediterranean style of the house.[4]

Villa Aurora Forum Berlin

The Villa Aurora is operated by two institutions: the “Kreis der Freunde und Förderer der Villa Aurora e.V.” situated in Berlin and the “Friends of Villa Aurora Inc” in Los Angeles. The Forum in Berlin organizes the proceedings of the jury about the selection of the annual fellowships. They are presenting the artistic outcomes of the fellowship to the German public through exhibitions, filmscreenings, lectures, concerts and the publishing of editions. This happens at the annual Villa Aurora night in Berlin. At this night, the fellows of the upcoming year are being presented. The Forum periodically invites to a representative show (e.g. Transatlantische Impulse II, Fall 2010 at the Martin-Gropius-Bau). Every year, on May 10, the Villa Aurora remembers the historic date of the burning of books in May 1933, but also addresses recents topics like exile, censorship and the worldwide prosecution of authors.

20 Years Villa Aurora

On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Villa Aurora as an institution for cultural exchange in the USA, the event Checkpoint California took place at the Deutsche Bank Kunsthalle.[5] Between June 12 and June 28, 2015 Villa Aurora Fellows (e.g. Dietrich Brüggemann, Stefan Kriekhaus, Uljana Wolf, Heinz Emigholz, Rosa von Praunheim, Steven Warwick, Veronika Kellndorfer, Steve Rowell, Felicitas Hoppe) presented their work, gave lectures and talked about their current projects. During the last day moderator Jörg Heisser led a panel with future Villa Aurora fellow Susan Philipsz and former fellow Christian Jankowski. Checkpoint California ended with a performance by Matan Zamir, Nicola Mascia, Claudia De Serpa Soares and Jeff Wood.

Fellows (extract)[6]

Literature

Marta Feuchtwanger. An Emigre Life: Munich, Berlin, Sanary, Pacific Palisades. Interviewed by Lawrence M. Weschler. University of California, Los Angeles 1976.

Marta Feuchtwanger: Only a Woman, Years Days Hours, Aufbau Verlag Berlin Leipzig, 1984.

Notes

  1. ↑ http://www.villa-aurora.org/en/organ.html
  2. ↑ http://www.villa-aurora.org/en/history.html
  3. ↑ http://www.villa-aurora.org/en/artists-residence.html
  4. ↑ Villa Aurora e.V.: "10 Jahre Villa Aurora 1995-2005". München 2005.
  5. ↑ http://checkpoint-california-en.villa-aurora.org/?page_id=54
  6. ↑ http://www.villa-aurora.org/en/archive.html

External links

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