Week 3 - Art Nouveau (United States)

Art Nouveau began in France and quickly made its way around Europe, affecting countries such as Belgium, Germany, and Spain. The movement gathered many architects and artists together in support of the new style, and it flourished. The great popularity even brought the movement into the United States where it had a different, less substantial impact. There were only two main designers who had an impact on the spread of Art Nouveau in the United States – Louis Tiffany and Louis Sullivan. While neither of them brought pure Art Nouveau, they brought the ideas it was trying to convey.

Louis Tiffany learned about Art Nouveau at a large exhibition in Paris and then brought it to the US when he returned. The main way he influenced Art Nouveau would be through his work with stained glass and other artistic mediums such as painting, jewelry making, and pottery. He designed many stained glass windows for churches, and his work was even sold by the founder of Art Nouveau, Samuel Bing.

Louis Sullivan is known as the “father of skyscrapers” and is one of the architects to help rebuild Chicago after the great fire. He applied Art Nouveau to his architecture, but more subdued in order to create a style unique to America. Sullivan used inspiration from nature to bring in Art Nouveau to this American style, as seen mostly in his Transportation Building and Carson, Pirie, and Scott, as well as his Charnley House and other pieces of architecture.

The development of technology and transportation allowed Art Nouveau to spread around quickly, hitting not only Europe, but also the United States. The ability for both Tiffany and Sullivan to visit France and then bring back this movement allowed America to benefit from this style that promoted creative, whimsical design.

Design Examples

Education at Yale University - stained glass designed by Louis Tiffany

Louis Sullivan's Guaranty Building

A metal bowl designed by Louis Tiffany

Current Applications

One Step Further

Louis Comfort Tiffany contributed a lot to the growth of Art Nouveau in America. He is best known for his work with stained glass, but he also created lamps, mosaics, jewelry, and metalwork.

Tiffany attended several schools as a young adult, such as Pennsylvania Military Academy, Eagleswood Military Academy, and then the National Academy of Design. He originally began his career with painting, but decided to focus on glassmaking instead. Tiffany developed a new method of joining pieces of colored glass together that involved soldering copper foil to each piece in order to reach an entirely new level of detail. Some of his glass work is seen in The First Presbyterian Church in Pennsylvania, the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City, as well as his own home, Laurelton Hall in New York.

He also won a myriad of awards starting in 1893. He participated in the World’s Fair in Chicago that year and had some of his lamps on display, and that resulted in 44 awards. In 1900, he participated in the Exposition Universelle and won a gold metal there, as well. Not only are his achievements shown through exposition awards, but his knowledge of design was shown through his father appointing Tiffany the first Design Director for Tiffany & Co.

It is also interesting to note that, not only did Tiffany work with glass and jewelry, but he also designed interiors. He designed the interior of the Mark Twain House in Connecticut as well as the interior of several rooms in the White House under the Arthur administration. Louis Tiffany was skilled in many different areas of design and very positively impacted the use of Art Nouveau in the United States.

Week 2 - Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau is a very creative and fluid style that began in France by Samuel Bing, a small shop owner. Both France and Belgium lead this movement, and it spread to Germany, Spain, as well as Scandinavian countries. This quick publicity was largely due to the increasing popularity of exhibitions, allowing word to spread even to the United States.

The Art Nouveau movement occurred from around 1890 until 1910, which is also when the Arts and Crafts movement was taking place. I find this interesting because, while both movements wanted to rebel against the Victorian era, they did so in different ways. The Arts and Crafts movement chose to revolt by completely disregarding the manufacturing process while the Art Nouveau movement still took advantage of manufacturing and modern technology.

Even though it did not reject industrialization, the Art Nouveau movement rebelled by rejecting traditional and historic design. The characteristics of this movement include the use of modern materials such as iron and glass, the use of industrial production and electricity, a relationship with painting and sculpture, the use of curvilinear forms, and the use of abstract forms derived from flowers, vines, shells, feathers, and other natural forms. This movement supported the growth of new and experimental directions in design and took inspiration from many famous artists such as Van Gogh, Munch, Gauguin, and Beardsley.

I appreciate this movement a lot because it brought about interesting interiors and furnishings that had not yet existed. Even just glancing at some furniture from this time, you can see Van Gogh’s Starry Night in many different pieces. I personally would never want to own furniture from this period because I more enjoy modern, rectilinear furnishings. Regardless of the fact that I don’t find the movement particularly attractive, I feel as though it was an important creative outlet for many people of that time.

Design Examples

 This chair was designed by Henry van de Velde. He wanted his furniture to be sculptural and ergonomic, which is seen in this chair.

This metalwork was designed by Victor Horta, and his love of curvilinear shapes is seen through this piece.

This interior was designed by Hector Guimard. He valued harmony and continuity, and that is seen through this design.

Current Applications

One Step Further

Victor Horta was a Belgian architect and was known as the most influential architect of the Art Nouveau period. He mainly focused on the curvature of his designs which were later described as “biomorphic whiplash.” These curvilinear botanical shapes usually took form in iron and stone facades as well as iron interiors.

As a child, Victor was interested in both music and architecture, but made architecture his career after being kicked out of a music school. For his schooling, he attended both the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent as well as the Academie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels. Victor’s achievements include winning the first Prix Godencharle for architecture, winning numerous sculpture competitions, becoming the President of the Central Society of Belgian Architecture, becoming the Director of the Academie Royale des Beaux-Arts, and being awarded the title of Baron by Albert 1 of Belgium.

Victor was a successful architect for his entire career – from the time he got his first architecture job at the age of 17 until his death at age 86. This period of time allowed for the completion of many different projects, such as Hotel Tassel, Hotel Solvay, the Volkshuis, the Museum for Fine Arts in Tournai, the Palais des Beaux-Arts, and the Brussels-Central railway station. Only the first half of this list were designed and constructed for the Art Nouveau period, because after the turn of the century Victor gracefully transitioned into Art Deco and Modernism. Because of his ability to understand the desires of the people, Victor was able to remain successful and loved even after his death in 1947. Four of his homes were deemed historically significant and were designated as a World Heritage Site – Hotel Tassel, Hotel Solvay, Hotel van Eetvelde, and Maison and Atelier Horta (the Horta Museum).