72 Facts About Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts.

Art Nouveau was popular during the Belle Epoque period that ended with the start of World War I in 1914.

One major objective of Art Nouveau was to break down the traditional distinction between fine arts and applied arts.

The Art Nouveau style began to receive more positive attention from critics in the late 1960s, with a major exhibition of the work of Hector Guimard at the Museum of Modern Art in 1970.

Term Art Nouveau was first used 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.

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Art Nouveau is related to, but not identical with, styles that emerged in many countries in Europe at about the same time.

Art Nouveau magazines, illustrated with photographs and colour lithographs, played an essential role in popularizing the new style.

Art Nouveau was a great admiror of Viollet-le-Duc, whose ideas he completely identified with.

Art Nouveau designed the residence of a prominent Belgian chemist, Emile Tassel, on a very narrow and deep site.

Art Nouveau designed a series of innovative glass display windows for Brussels shops, restaurants and galleries, in what a local critic called "a veritable delirium of originality".

Art Nouveau died in 1901, just as the movement was beginning to receive recognition.

Art Nouveau was an early Art Nouveau theorist, demanding the use of dynamic, often opposing lines.

Art Nouveau played an important role in the German Werkbund, before returning to Belgium.

The Maison de l'Art Nouveau showed paintings by Georges Seurat, Paul Signac and Toulouse-Lautrec, glass from Louis Comfort Tiffany and Emile Galle, jewellery by Rene Lalique, and posters by Aubrey Beardsley.

Art Nouveau helped decorate the famous cabaret Le Chat Noir in 1885, made his first posters for the Fetes de Paris and a celebrated poster of Sarah Bernhardt in 1890.

Art Nouveau was a luxury style, which required expert and highly-paid craftsmen, and could not be easily or cheaply mass-produced.

Art Nouveau's house was completed in 1903, the same year as Horta's Hotel Tassel, and featured sgraffiti murals on the facade.

Art Nouveau commissioned the sculptor Alfred Crick and the painter Adolphe Crespin to decorate the facades of houses with their work.

Art Nouveau wrote, "It is necessary to fight against the art of illusion, to and to recognize the lie, in order to find the essence and not the illusion.

Art Nouveau's furniture was designed to be strictly functional, and to respect the natural forms of wood, rather than bending or twisting it as if it were metal.

Art Nouveau pointed to the example of Egyptian furniture, and preferred chairs with right angles.

Art Nouveau often included very tall towers to his buildings to make them more prominent, a practice used by other Art Nouveau architects of the period, including Joseph Maria Olbrich in Vienna and Eliel Saarinen in Finland.

Art Nouveau had its roots in Britain, in the Arts and Crafts movement which started in 1860s and reached international recognition by 1880s.

Art Nouveau established a major reputation as a furniture designer and decorator, working closely with his wife, Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh, a prominent painter and designer.

Art Nouveau specialised in plaques and in tube-lined vases marketed as "secessionist ware".

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German Art Nouveau is commonly known by its German name, Jugendstil, or "Youth Style".

Art Nouveau's founded Marfo-Mariinsky Convent in Moscow in 1908 and its katholikon is recognized as an Art Nouveau masterpiece.

Art Nouveau in Strasbourg was a specific brand, in that it combined influences from Nancy, and Brussels, with influences from Darmstadt, and Vienna, to operate a local synthesis which reflected the history of the city between the Germanic and the French realms.

Art Nouveau studied at Otto Wagner's classes in Vienna and worked in the Laybach City Council from 1894 to 1923.

Art Nouveau signed both the architectural and decoration plans of the casino.

Specific to Art Nouveau is the embossed ornamentation of the facades, either with naturalistic floral motifs, such as those of the School of Nancy, or motifs inspired by marine fauna, such as shells and dolphins.

Art Nouveau was later known as a painter and a theatrical scenery designer; he designed the sets for two celebrated Puccini operas Gianni Schicchi and Turandot.

Art Nouveau studied at the Milanese Academy of Brera, and later the Academie des Beaux-Arts in Paris.

Art Nouveau's work was distinguished by its exoticism and eccentricity, included silverware, textiles, ceramics, and musical instruments, but he is best remembered for his innovative furniture designs, shown first in the 1888 Milan Fine Arts Fair.

Valencian Art Nouveau defining characteristics are a notable use of ceramics in decoration, both in the facade and in ornamentation, and the use of Valencian regional motives.

Art Nouveau was popular in the Nordic countries, where it was usually known as Jugendstil, and was often combined with the National Romantic Style of each country.

Art Nouveau is known for his illustrations of the Kalevala, the Finnish national epic, as well as for painting numerous Judendstil buildings in the Duchy.

Norway was aspiring independence and local Art Nouveau was connected with a revival inspired by Viking folk art and crafts.

The World of Art style made less use of the vegetal and floral forms of French Art Nouveau; it drew heavily upon the bright colours and exotic designs of Russian folklore and fairy tales.

The most influential contribution of the "World of Art Nouveau" was the creation of a new ballet company, the Ballets Russes, headed by Diaghilev, with costumes and sets designed by Bakst and Benois.

Art Nouveau was stranded in Paris first by the outbreak of World War I, and then by the Russian Revolution in 1917, and ironically never performed in Russia.

The quantity and quality of Art Nouveau architecture was among the criteria for including Riga in UNESCO World Cultural Heritage.

Art Nouveau invented equally original decoration for the National Farmer's Bank of Owatonna, Minnestota and the Merchants' National Bank in Grinell, Iowa.

Art Nouveau invented a specifically American variety of Art Nouveau, declaring that decorative forms should oscillate, surge, mix and derive without end.

Art Nouveau created works of great precision which sometimes combined Gothic with Art Nouveau themes.

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Early Art Nouveau often featured more stylized forms expressing movement, such as the coup de fouet or "whiplash" line, depicted in the cyclamen plants drawn by designer Hermann Obrist in 1894.

Unlike Symbolist painting, however, Art Nouveau has a distinctive appearance; and, unlike the artisan-oriented Arts and Crafts movement, Art Nouveau artists readily used new materials, machined surfaces, and abstraction in the service of pure design.

Art Nouveau did not eschew the use of machines, as the Arts and Crafts movement did.

Art Nouveau architecture made use of many technological innovations of the late 19th century, especially the use of exposed iron and large, irregularly shaped pieces of glass for architecture.

Architecturally, Art Nouveau has affinities with styles that, although modern, exist outside the modernist tradition established by architects like Walter Gropius and Le Corbusier.

Art Nouveau is represented in painting and sculpture, but it is most prominent in architecture and the decorative arts.

Art Nouveau was no longer confined to galleries, museums and salons; it could be found on Paris walls, and in illustrated art magazines, which circulated throughout Europe and to the United States.

The most popular theme of Art Nouveau posters was women; women symbolizing glamour, modernity and beauty, often surrounded by flowers.

Art Nouveau began with engraved book illustrations for Le Morte d'Arthur, then black and white illustrations for Salome by Oscar Wilde, which brought him fame.

Art Nouveau helped decorate the famous cabaret Le Chat noir in 1885 and made his first posters for the Fetes de Paris.

Art Nouveau made a celebrated poster of Sarah Bernhardt in 1890, and a wide variety of book illustrations.

Art Nouveau went on to design products, from jewellery to biscuit boxes, in his distinctive style.

Art Nouveau's one Art-Nouveau inspired painting, "Slava", is a portrait of the daughter of his patron in Slavic costume, which was modelled after his theatrical posters.

Painters most closely associated with Art Nouveau were Les Nabis, post-impressionist artists who were active in Paris from 1888 until 1900.

Art Nouveau's workshops produced several different series of the Tiffany lamp in different floral designs, along with stained glass windows, screens, vases and a range of decorative objects.

Art Nouveau's works were first imported to Germany, then to France by Siegfried Bing, and then became one of the decorative sensations of the 1900 Exposition.

Art Nouveau period brought a notable stylistic revolution to the jewellery industry, led largely by the major firms in Paris.

Early notable Paris jewellers in the Art Nouveau style included Louis Aucoc, whose family jewellery firm dated to 1821.

Art Nouveau architecture was a reaction against the eclectic styles that dominated European architecture in the second half of the 19th century.

Bow windows were finally allowed in 1903, and Art Nouveau architects went to the opposite extreme, most notably in the houses of Jules Lavirotte, which were essentially large works of sculpture, completely covered with decoration.

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An important neighbourhood of Art Nouveau houses appeared in the French city of Nancy, around the Villa Majorelle, the residence of the furniture designer Louis Majorelle.

Furniture design in the Art Nouveau period was closely associated with the architecture of the buildings; the architects often designed the furniture, carpets, light fixtures, doorknobs, and other decorative details.

One designer who did introduce Art Nouveau themes was Charles Rohlfs in Buffalo, New York, whose designs for American white oak furniture were influenced by motifs of Celtic Art and Gothic art, with touches of Art Nouveau in the metal trim applied to the pieces.

Art Nouveau ceramics were influenced by traditional and modern Japanese and Chinese ceramics, whose vegetal and floral motifs fitted well with the Art Nouveau style.

One of the pioneer French Art Nouveau ceramists was Ernest Chaplet, whose career in ceramics spanned thirty years.

Art Nouveau began producing stoneware influenced by Japanese and Chinese prototypes.

Art Nouveau led the factory to worldwide recognition by demonstrating its innovative products at world fairs and international exhibitions, including the 1873 World Fair in Vienna, then at the 1878 World Fair in Paris, where Zsolnay received a Grand Prix.