1C. metmuseum.org- Art Nouveau

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Jardinière, ca. 1893 Lucien Lévy- Dhurmer (French, 18651953); Clément Massier (French, 18441917) Golfe- Juan, France Earthenware with metallic glaz e; H. 9 1/2 in. (24.1 cm) Purchase, Funds from various donors, The Charles E. Sampson Memorial Fund, and Jerome M. Cohen and The Isak and Rose Weinman Foundation Inc. Gifts, 2005 (2005.220) Vase, 18991900 Designer: Georges Hoentschel (French, 18551915); Probable Maker: Emile Grittel (French, 18701953) France; Saint- Armand- en- Puisaye Glaz ed stoneware; H. 44 1/2 in. (113 cm) Purchase, Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Foundation Gift, 2007 (2007.27) Panel, ca. 1900 Hector Guimard (French, 18671942) Silk and paint on silk; 27 x 18 in. (68.6 x 45.7 cm) Gift of Mrs. Hector Guimard, 1949 (49.85.11) Vase, ca. 1885 Maker: Olivier de Sorra; Factory: Pierrefonds French (Pierrefonds) Stoneware; H. 11 3/4 in. (29.8 cm) Marks: PH, a helmet between (impressed on underside); PIERREFONDS (below); 1; 42 Gift of Lloyd and Barbara Macklowe, 1991 (1991.390.1)

Hanging cabinet , ca. 1890 Émile Gallé (French, 18461904) French (Nancy) Beechwood, various marquetry woods; H. 40 in. (101.6 cm), W. 12 in. (30.5 cm), D. 48 in. (121.9 cm) Anonymous Gift, 1982 (1982.246) Vase, 189396 Designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany (American, 18481933); Made by Tiffany Glass and Decorating Company (18921902) American; Made in Mid- Atlantic, Corona, New York, America Favrile glass; 14 1/8 x 11 1/2 in. (35.9 x 29.2 cm) Gift of H. O. Havemeyer, 1896 (96.17.10) Washst and, 1904 Charles Rennie Mackintosh (Scottish, 1868–1928), Designer Oak, ceramic tile, colored and mirror glass, and lead; 63 1/4 x 51 1/4 x 20 3/8 in. (160.7 x 130.2 x 51.8 cm) Purchase, Lila Acheson Wallace Gift, 1994 (1994.120) Vase, ca. 1896 Designer: Philippe Wolfers (Belgian, 18581929), by Philippe Wolfers & Wolfers Frères Belgian (Brussels) Silver, partly gilded; H. 8 1/2 in. (21.5 cm) Maker's mark: three stars in triangle for Philippe Wolfers & Wolfers Frères; alloy mark: "800"; assay mark: crescent and crown in rectangle for Germany, ca. 18951900 (applied when the vase was imported to Germany) Purchase, Friends of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts Gifts, 2003 (2003.236)

Tea service, ca. 1910 Josef Hoffmann (Austrian, 18701956) Silver, ebony, amethyst, carnelian; H. (large teapot) 5 3/8 in. (13.7 cm) Cynthia Haz en Polsky and Leon B. Polsky Fund, 2000 (2000.278.1.9) Side chair (part of a set ), ca. 1899 Edward Colonna (18621948), for L'Art Nouveau Bing, Paris French Palissander wood, damask upholstery; 35 1/4 x 16 7/8 x 15 in. (89.5 x 42.9 x 38.1 cm) Purchase, Edward C. Moore Jr. Gift, 1926 (26.228.5)

Pit cher, ca. 1899 Edward Colonna (German, 18621948) (silver mounts only); Potter: Alexandre Bigot (French, 18621927) French Stoneware, grès flammé, with silver mounts; H. 3 1/8 in. (7.9 cm) Purchase, Edward C. Moore Jr. Gift, 1926 (26.228.7) The Scream, 1895 Edvard Munch (Norwegian, 18631944) Lithograph; image: 14 1/16 x 9 5/16 in. (35.7 x 23.6 cm); sheet: 20 1/4 x 15 5/8 in. (51.4 x 39.7 cm) Bequest of Scofield Thayer, 1982 (1984.1203.1) Cabinet - vit rine, 1899 Gustave Serrurier- Bovy (Belgian, 18581910) Belgian (Liège) Red narra wood, ash, copper, enamel, glass; 98 x 84 x 25 in. (248.9 x 213.4 x 63.5 cm) Marks: SERRURIER/LIEGE (stamped on back three times) Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd Macklowe, 1981 (1981.512.4) Moulin Rouge: La Goulue, 1891 Henri de Toulouse- Lautrec (French, 18641901) Lithograph printed in four colors; three sheets of wove paper; 74 13/16 x 45 7/8 in. (189.99 x 116.51 cm) Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1932 (32.88.12) Vase, ca. 1899

Designer: Max L채uger (German, 18641952); Factory: Kandern Tonwerke German (Baden) Earthenware; H. 4 3/4 in. (12.1 cm) Marks: .MUSTERGESETZL.GES[CHTZT]; 184; MLK and Bavarian Shield in square (L채uger Kandern mark) Gift of Robert L. Isaacson, 1991 (1991.182.1) Brooch, ca. 1900 Manufacturer: Georges Fouquet (French, 18621957); Designer: Alphonse Mucha (Cz ech, 18601939) Gold, enamel, mother- of- pearl, opal, emerald, colored stones, gold paint; Diam. 1/2 in. (1.3 cm) Gift of Eva and Michael Chow, 2003 (2003.560)

Inkwell, ca. 1900 Maker: Pierre- Adriene Dalpayrat (French, 18441910); Mountmaker: Édouard Colonna (18621948); Firm: L'Art Nouveau Bing French (Bourg- la- Reine) Glaz ed earthenware, gilt bronz e; 3 15/16 x 5 5/8 in. (10 x 14.3 cm) Marks: (stamped on unglaz ed bottom) ART NOUVEAU/BING; (painted in dark brown on bottom) 3 Rogers Fund, 1999 (1999.398.3) Pendant , ca. 1901 RenÊ- Jules Lalique (French, 18601945) French (Paris) Gold, enamel, opal, pearl, diamonds Mark: LALIQUE (stamped on bottom edge) Gift of Clare Le Corbeiller, 1991 (1991.164)

Jardinière, ca. 1902 Henry van de Velde (Belgian, 18631957); Manufacturer: Theodore Muller, Weimar Silver; 4 1/8 x 14 in. (10.5 x 35.6 cm) Purchase, Cynthia Haz en Polsky Gift, 2000 (2000.350)

Cof f ee service, 19001904 Designer: Léon Kann (French, active 1896ca. 1915; active at Sèvres 189698, 19001908); Sèvres Manufactory (French, 1740present) Hard- paste porcelain; H. 7 in. (17.8 cm) Marks: [1] S / 1900 in a triangle printed in underglaz e black (factory year mark indicating pâte nouvelle); [2] incised marks Gift of Diane R. Wolf, 1988 (1988.287.1a,b) Armchair, ca. 1905

Designer: Henri- Jules- Ferdinand Bellery- Desfontaines (French, 18671910); possibly by Gagnant; possibly carved

by Léon- Albert Jallot (French, 18741967); tapestry covers possibly by factory of Antoine Jorrand, Aubusson French (Paris) Walnut, copper, brass, tapestry covers, brown plush; 56 1/2 x 23 3/8 x 26 in. (143.5 x 59.4 x 66 cm) Purchase, Friends of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts Gifts, 1990 (1990.213) Vase, ca. 19016 Designer: Max Läuger (German, 18641952); Maker: Walter Sherf; Manufacturer: Metallwarenfabrik für Kleinkunst German (Baden) Glass, pewter; H. 5 in. (12.7 cm) Gift of Robert L. Isaacson, 1991 (1991.182.2) Maude Adams (18721953) as Joan of Arc , 1909 Alphonse Mucha (Cz ech, 18601939) Oil on canvas; 82 1/4 x 30 in. (208.9 x 76.2 cm) Signed, dated, and inscribed: (lower left) Mucha / 1909; (bottom) MAUDE ADAMS as JOAN of ARC Gift of A. J. Kobler, 1920 (20.33) Mäda Primavesi (1903–2000), 1912 Gustav Klimt (Austrian, 1862–1918) Oil on canvas Signed (lower right): GVSTAV / KLIMT Gift of André and Clara Mertens, in memory of her mother, Jenny Pulitz er Steiner, 1964 (64.148) From the 1880s until the First World War, western Europe and the United States witnessed the development of Art Nouveau ("New Art"). Taking inspiration from the unruly aspects of the natural world, Art Nouveau influenced art and architecture especially in the applied arts, graphic work, and illustration. Sinuous lines and "whiplash" curves were derived, in part, from botanical studies and illustrations of deep- sea organisms such as those by German biologist Ernst Heinrich Haeckel (18341919) in Kunstformen der Natur (Art Forms in Nature, 1899). Other publications, including Floriated Ornament (1849) by Gothic Revivalist Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin (18121852) and The Grammar of Ornament (1856) by British architect and theorist Owen Jones (18091874), advocated nature as the primary source of inspiration for a generation of artists seeking to break away from past styles. The unfolding of Art Nouveau's flowing line may be understood as a metaphor for the freedom and release sought by its practitioners and admirers from the weight of artistic tradition and critical expectations.

Additionally, the new style was an outgrowth of two nineteenthcentury English developments for which design reform (a reaction to prevailing art education, industrializ ed mass production, and the debasement of historic styles) was a leitmotifthe Arts and Crafts movement and the Aesthetic movement. The former emphasiz ed a return to handcraftsmanship and traditional techniques. The latter promoted a similar credo of "art for art's

sake" that provided the foundation for non- narrative paintings, for instance, Whistler's Nocturnes. It further drew upon elements of Japanese art ("japonisme"), which flooded Western markets, mainly in the form of prints, after trading rights were established with Japan in the 1860s. Indeed, the gamut of late nineteenthcentury artistic trends prior to World War I, including those in painting and the early designs of the Wiener Werkstätte, may be defined loosely under the rubric of Art Nouveau.

The term art nouveau first appeared in the 1880s in the Belgian journal L'Art Moderne to describe the work of Les Vingt, twenty painters and sculptors seeking reform through art. Les Vingt, like much of the artistic community throughout Europe and America, responded to leading nineteenth- century theoreticians such as French Gothic Revival architect Eugène- Emmanuel Viollet- leDuc (18141879) and British art critic John Ruskin (18191900), who advocated the unity of all the arts, arguing against segregation between the fine arts of painting and sculpture and the so- called lesser decorative arts. Deeply influenced by the socially aware teachings of William Morris and the Arts and Crafts movement, Art Nouveau designers endeavored to achieve the synthesis of art and craft, and further, the creation of the spiritually uplifting Gesamtkunstwerk ("total work of art") encompassing a variety of media. The successful unification of the fine and applied arts was achieved in many such complete designed environments as Victor Horta and Henry van de Velde's Hotel Tassel and Van Eetvelde House (Brussels, 189395), Charles Rennie Mackintosh and Margaret Macdonald's design of the Hill House (Helensburgh, near Glasgow, 19034), and Josef Hoffmann and Gustav Klimt's Palais Stocklet dining room (Brussels, 190511) (2000.350; 1994.120; 2000.278.1- .9).

Painting styles such as Post- Impressionism and Symbolism (the "Nabis") shared close ties with Art Nouveau and each was practiced by designers who adapted them for the applied arts, architecture, interior designs, furnishings, and patterns. They contributed to an overall expressiveness and the formation of a cohesive style (64.148).

In December 1895, German- born Paris art dealer Siegfried Bing opened a gallery called L'Art Nouveau for the contemporary décor he exhibited and sold there (1999.398.3). Though Bing's gallery is credited with the populariz ation of the movement and its name, Art Nouveau style reached an international audience through the vibrant graphic arts printed in such periodicals as The Savoy, La Plume, Jugend, Dekorative Kunst, The Yellow Book, and The Studio. The Studio featured the bold, Symbolistinspired linear drawings of Aubrey Beardsley (18721898).

Beardsley's flamboyant black and white block print J'ai baisé ta bouche lokanaan for Oscar Wilde's play Salomé (1894), with its brilliant incorporation of Japanese two- dimensional composition, may be regarded as a highlight of the Aesthetic movement and an early manifestation of Art Nouveau taste in England. Other influential graphic artists included Alphonse Mucha, Jules Chéret, and Henri de Toulouse- Lautrec, whose vibrant poster art often expressed the variety of roles of women in belle époque societyfrom femme nouvelle (a "new woman" who rejected the

conventional ideals of femininity, domesticity, and subservience) to demimonde (20.33; 32.88.12). Female figures were often incorporated as fairies or sirens in the jewelry of René Lalique, Georges Fouquet, and Philippe Wolfers (1991.164; 2003.560; 2003.236).

Art Nouveau style was particularly associated with France, where it was called variously Style Jules Verne, Le Style Métro (after Hector Guimard's iron and glass subway entrances), Art belle époque, and Art fin de siècle (49.85.11). In Paris, it captured the imagination of the public at large at the 1900 Exposition Universelle, the last and grandest of a series of fairs organiz ed every eleven years from 1798. Various structures showcased the innovative style, including the Porte Monumentale entrance, an elaborate polychromatic dome with electronic lights designed by René Binet (18661911); the Pavillon Bleu, a restaurant alongside the Pont d'Iena at the foot of the Eiffel Tower featuring the work of Gustave Serrurier- Bovy (18581910) (1981.512.4); Art Nouveau Bing, a series of six domestic interiors which included Symbolist art (26.228.5); and the pavilion of the Union Centrale des Arts Décoratifs, an organiz ation dedicated to the revival and moderniz ation of the decorative arts as an economic stimulus and expression of national identity which offered an important display of decorative objects (1991.182.2; 26.228.7; 1988.287.1a,b). Sharing elements of the French Rococo (and its nineteenthcentury revivals), including styliz ed motifs derived from nature, fantasy, and Japanese art, the furnishings exhibited were produced in the new taste and yet perpetuated an acclaimed tradition of French craftsmanship. The use of luxury veneers and finely cast gilt mounts in the furniture of leading cabinetmakers Georges de Feure (18681943), Louis Majorelle (18591926), Édouard Colonna (18621948), and Eugène Gaillard (18621933) indicated the Neo- Rococo influence of François Linke (18551946) (26.228.5).

The Exposition Universelle was followed by two shows at which many luminaries of European Art Nouveau exhibited.

They included the Glasgow International Exhibition in 1901 that featured the fantastical Russian pavilions of Fyodor Shekhtel' (18591926) and the Esposiz ione Internaz ionale d'Arte Decorativa Moderna at Turin in 1902 that showcased the work of furniture designer Carlo Bugatti of Milan (69.69).

As in France, the "new art" was called by different names in the various style centers where it developed throughout Europe. In Belgium, it was called Style nouille or Style coup de fouet. In Germany, it was Jugendstil or "young style," after the popular journal Die Jugend (1991.182.2). Part of the broader Modernista movement in Barcelona, its chief exponent was the architect and redesigner of the Sagrada Familia (Holy Family) cathedral (Barcelona, begun 1882), Antoni Gaudí (18521926). In Italy, it was named Arte nuova, Stile floreale, or La Stile Liberty after the London firm of Liberty & Co., which supplied Oriental ceramics and textiles to aesthetically aware Londoners in the 1870s and produced English Art Nouveau objects such as the Celtic Revival "Cymric" and "Tudric" ranges of silver by Archibald Knox (18641933). Other style centers included Austria and Hungary, where Art Nouveau was called the Sezessionstil. In Russia, Saint Petersburg and Moscow were the two centers of production for Stil' modern. "Tiffany Style" in the United States was named for the legendary Favrile glass designs of Louis Comfort Tiffany.

Although international in scope, Art Nouveau was a short- lived movement whose brief incandescence was a precursor of modernism, which emphasiz ed function over form and the elimination of superfluous ornament. Although a reaction to historic revivalism, it brought Victorian excesses to a dramatic fin-de-siècle crescendo. Its influence has been far reaching and is evident in Art Deco furniture designs, whose sleek surfaces are enriched by exotic wood veneers and ornamental inlays. Dramatic Art Nouveauinspired graphics became popular in the turbulent social and political milieu of the 1960s, among a new generation challenging conventional taste and ideas.

Cybele Gont ar Department of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Citation Gontar, Cybele. "Art Nouveau". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History.

New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/artn/hd_artn.htm (October 2006)

T hese related Museum Bulletin or Journal articles may or may not represent the most current scholarship.

Baetjer, Katharine "About Mäda." Metropolitan Museum Journal, Vol. 40 (2005).

Further Reading

Museum Journal, Vol. 40 (2005).

JSTOR | PDF

Karpinski, Caroline "Munch and Lautrec." The Arwas, Victor Art Nouveau: The French Aesthetic. London: Andreas Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, v. 23, no. 3 Papadakis, 2002.

(November, 1964). .

Escritt, Stephen Art Nouveau. London: Phaidon, 2000 .

JSTOR | PDF Fahr- Becker, Gabriele Art Nouveau. Cologne: Könemann, 1997.

Greenhalgh, Paul, ed. Art Nouveau, 18901914. Exhibition catalogue.. London: V&A Publications, 2000.

Weisberg, Gabriel P. Art Nouveau Bing: Paris Style 1900.

Exhibition catalogue.. New York: Abrams, 1986.

Weisberg, Gabriel P., Edwin Becker, and Évelyne Possémé, eds.

The Origins of L'Art Nouveau: The Bing Empire. Exhibition catalogue..

Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum, 2004.

Related exhibitions and online f eatures