Allo Allo? Nancy calling Part 4: Art Nouveau
August 29th 2006 11:42
Bonjour tout le monde!
As promised the other day, I will dedicate this post to Art Nouveau, which was in part developed in Nancy, which became a centre for the style.
Art Nouveau is a fad which hit its peak in popularity at the beginning of the 20th century. Apparently, the name Art Nouveau (which translated means New Art) came from the name of a gallery in Paris called the Maison de l’Art Nouveau. It was owned by Samuel Bing and had displays of objects which were made in the same style.
This is a book cover designed by Arthur Mackmurdo in 1883 for the book Wren's City Churches and is an early example of the Art Nouveau style (this picture is public domain and can be found at wikipedia.org)
1900: the Universal Exposition in Paris. The first time when the “modern style” of Art Nouveau permeated every medium. Then again in 1902 at the Turin Exposition, where it was shown that Europe really was the “happening centre for this new art form.
Amazingly enough, Art Nouveau enabled many technological advancements in architecture because of the large irregular shapes of free flowing iron and glass, which dominated buildings constructed in that time.
Unfortunately, by World War 1, these types of buildings became to expensive to produce, so this highly stylised form slowly disappeared in favour of a cheaper and more traditional form of modernism.
That’s it for now. A second post on Art Nouveau tomorrow
À demain
Melinda
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