Click to enlarge.  Klimt, Watersnakes I (Girlfriends), 1904-07  
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Rooted in the English Arts & Crafts movement by William Morris and the Pre-Raphaelites (see our article), the new decorative arts movement was developed by painters, poster artists, sculptors and jewelry makers towards the end of the 19th Century.

With the rapid and heavy urban development throughout European and American cities in the 1880’s and 1890’s, the natural enviroment was replaced by steel, bricks and roads. Artists and designers created new hybrid forms that incorporated both the new artificial elements and nature’s organic forms.

Announcement of the opening of the
first Art Nouveau Salon1895

In 1895, a successful Japanese art dealer and collector Siegfried Bing in Paris named his new gallery L’Art Nouveau (New Art). This decorative arts style would influence Europe and North American from the early 1890’s until the first World War (1914). Art historians declared that when the World War started it spelled the end of Art Nouveau. In fact the Art Deco movement was the direct descendent of Art Nouveau.

The fusion of oriental art, the Pre-Raphaelites, the decorative arts and celtic art produced this new form of art that breakaway from the past. The Japanese embroidered silk collection by Bing from the 19th Century shows the inspiration from Oriental art. The swirls and sinuous lines inspired by naturalistic plant and organic forms along with asymmetry and elongated curves are hallmarks of this decorative art movement.

Klimt, Thespis' Chariot 1886

 

The Austrian Painter Gustav Klimt (1862 – 1918) well represented this movement. He infused Symolism into Art Nouveau. As a founder of the Vienna Secession (1897) he was instrumental in spreading Art Nouveau throughout Europe. The Pre-Raphaelite influence was present in Klimt’s earlier paintings as shown here.

Klimt, Emilie Floge 1902

The other characteristics of his paintings are the symbolic-erotic elements, the richly ornamented dresses and the 2 dimensional flatness of his figures. Klimt fathered many children from his numerous affairs with his models as well as wealthy female patrons. No doubt the pregnant ladies were readily available to be his models. (see Hope I, Hope II) The elegant and decorative garments in his paintings could also be inspired by his life long girlfriend Emilie Floge, a fashion designer.

In the United States, the leading Art Nouveau artist was Louis Comfort Tiffany, (member of the famous Tiffany jewelry family) who developed a new way of producing iridescent and opalescent glass work. The Art Nouveau motifs can be seen throughout his successful line of glass products including lamps, vases and other glass forms.