Director Alysa Nahmias on László Moholy-Nagy and The New Bauhaus

On this episode of Archinect Sessions we’re sharing a conversation I had with Alysa Nahmias, the director and producer of the documentary film “The New Bauhaus.” We recorded this conversation last month, poolside, a few hours before the film premiered to a packed house in the Annenberg Theater at the Palm Springs International Film Festival.

Alysa, a trained architect-turned-filmmaker, made her directorial debut in 2011 with Unfinished Spaces, a critically acclaimed documentary about the unfinished National Art School in Cuba. 

While she has a number of producing credits under her belt, The New Bauhaus is the second documentary film project that she directed. The film focuses on the life and legacy of László Moholy-Nagy, the Hungarian artist and teacher most famously known through his work at the Bauhaus. It’s a beautifully told story, presented in a unique, non-linear fashion, narrated by Hans Ulrich Obrist who represent Maholy in a surprisingly effective way. 

The film will be screened again at this year’s Modernism Week in Palm springs, tomorrow, February 14th, followed by screenings at Melbourne Design Week the Architecture & Design Film Festival in DC in March, and in Los Angeles, at SC-Arc, in April. Full details can be found at thenewbauhaus.com.