Art Nouveau

The Art Nouveau style and its influences, from Liberty & Co. to Rene Lalique, Louis Comfort Tiffany, Anton Gaudi and archibald knox.

The art nouveau style was a conscious attempt at modernism and a determined departure by many artists and designers, from the traditional victorian forms of design.

Designers rejected the inspiration of classical European art and instead looked to Japanese, Celtic and other folk art as a basis for their work. This can be seen in works by artists such as Gustav Klimt.

Typical motifs come from nature: flowers, insects and birds. Lines curve and wind, straight lines were scorned by art nouveau designers.

Symbolism is important in the designs. For example a leaf may be just a leaf or perhaps it is part of the female body. Designers used forms from the natural world in ways that suggested they might represent human limbs. They used traditional materials like wood, glass, and pewter.

The style, which literaly means "new art," gets its name from a design shop, La Maison de l'Art Nouveau, which German entrepreneur Siegfried Bing opened in Paris in 1895.

The shop was one of the major outlets for the glass of Emile Galle, the art glass of Louis Tiffany, the jewellery of Rene Lalique, and the furniture of Eugene Gaillard and George DeFeure. All signature artists in the art nouveau tradition. These artists were largely reacting against the Victorian aesthetic, a style described by Arlie as often fussy and inhibited.

A favourite art nouveau theme was a nymph with flowers in her abundant streaming hair. She appeared on the posters of Alfons Mucha and among the opals and moonstones of René Lalique's jewelry.

Other favourites were peacocks, dragonflies, and moths. In brilliant enamels and gold filigree, they were worked into combs, brooches, and other adornments. Morning glories glimmered through the stained glass of Louis Comfort Tiffany. Irises were inlaid in the marquetry cabinets of Louis Majorelle (1859-1926). Cresting waves broke and seaweed clustered around Art Nouveau vases. A dish might be an unadorned lotus leaf.

Other botanical forms were arranged in abstract patterns and were symmetrically arrayed around mirror or picture frames or repeated on fabrics and wallpapers or in mural decorations.

Art Nouveau was out of fashion before World War I had begun.

From the 1920s to the 1950s it was considered by critics as a moribund, and even ugly, style.

However, Around 1960, a revival began. In reaction to the unimaginative glass-and-steel rectangular architecture of the 1950s and the british 'Utility Scheme'.

Critics began to turn back to the style of the 1900's. Numerous exhibitions were held, scholarly publications on art nouveau began to appear, and prices for art nouveau objects soared.

Art Nouveau was incorporated into the rebellious psychedelic style of the 1960s and finally achieved its place as a significant style in the history of modern art.

It is only comparatively recently that art nouveau was accepted as a 'style' and accorded any real recognition.

It had been seen as a collection of different styles with little in common except, perhaps, a taste for excess and flamboyant decoration.

Not only is there no consensus on exactly what art nouveau is, there is even some argument over the period it covered although generally it is thought to cover the 1890s through to around 1910.

Art nouveau was not universally acclaimed, particularly in England. Many critics of the period saw it as decadent and self indulgent.

For example, the sculptor, Sir Alfred Gilbert who created Eros in Piccadilly Circus, once said ;

“L’Art Nouveau, forsooth. Absolute nonsense. It belongs to the young lady’s seminary and the duffer’s paradise."