The MAK Center for Art and Architecture at the Schindler House will present “R.M. Schindler: The Prequel” for a public preview tonight from 7-9 p.m., with a walk-through beginning at 6:30 p.m. The exhibition will explore the intellectual climate in Vienna at the time of Schindler’s architectural training, and highlight the trajectory connecting 19th century Europe with 20th century West Hollywood.

R.M. Schindler’s design for a cemetery and crematorium with a chapel for 5 million people, presented as his thesis project at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna from 1912-1913. (photo courtesy of R.M. Schindler papers, Architecture and Design Collection, Art, Design & Architecture Museum, UC Santa Barbara)

Curated by Christian Witt-Dörring, curator at MAK Vienna, “R.M. Schindler: The Prequel: Josef Hoffman, Adolf Loos, Otto Wagner and the Modernist Debates of Early 20th Century Vienna” will be on view at the Schindler House from Sept. 11-Dec. 7.

“R.M. Schindler: The Prequel” contextualizes the landmark 1922 Kings Road House as a direct result of the debates playing out in Vienna’s Modernist circles from 1890-1914, when Schindler was a student and young practitioner. Through photographs, drawings, reproductions and furniture designs, the exhibition reviews the foundations laid by Wagner, as well as the next generation responses to his work as personified by Loos and Hoffman.

The exhibition includes prominent publications of the era, including Wagner’s “Moderne Architektur,” a few issues of Loos’s “Das Andere” journal, and Frank Lloyd Wright’s “Wasmuth Portfolio.”

The MAK Center is located at 835 North Kings Rd. For further information about the MAK Center for Art and Architecture at the Schindler House, visit MAKCenter.org or call (323)651-1510.