Styles in furniture - Art Nouveau

The Art Nouveau style is characteristic of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The name comes from the gallery opened by Siegfried Bing in Paris in 1895 and called House of Art Nouveau. Bing, originally from Hamburg, was a connoisseur and importer of Japanese art. He became interested in Modern Art, as it was called at the time, and opened the gallery, thus establishing a style with a new name in the arts.

The Universal Exhibition of 1900 is the moment of official recognition of the style

The new style of art swept across Europe and the US, initially under different names. In Germany it was called Jugendstil - young style in Italy Floral Style or Liberty,and in Spain Modernism or Modernist. Gradually, except for Germany which stuck to the original name, the rest of Europe and the USA adopted the name Art Nouveau.

Full recognition of the style came with the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1900, when Bing rented an entire pavilion for his exhibits.

The exhibition was a great success for the representatives of the new style, a success that would be repeated in 1902 in Turin at the First International Exhibition of Modern Decorative Art. The Liberty style was represented at the exhibition by Carlo Bugatti.

The style encompasses all the arts, and there are several prominent representatives. Among them are Spanish architect and sculptor Antonio Gaudi, American glass decoration maker Louis Comfort Tiffany, French jewellery and glassware maker Rene Lalique, French furniture maker Louis Majorelle, Scottish architect and designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh and many others.

Antonio Gaudi furniture | photo source: impressivemagazine.com

The style of long, delicate lines and bright, natural colours

Art Nouveau is the style of round, elongated lines, taken from nature. In fact, nature is very much present, not through stylised images or symbols, but by representing flowers, insects, birds, leaves and other parts of nature as closely as possible. Everything is rounded and delicate, and the colours as vivid and natural as possible. Japanese prints were also a source of inspiration for artists of the period.

Art Nouveau furniture is characterized by delicate curved lines and floral motifs. The general impression is that there are no straight lines. The wood used is hardwood - oak, walnut, ash, mahogany, beech - which is carefully curved into distinctive shapes.

The colours used are mustard, olive, brown, gold, with tones and accents of lilac, red, blue, salmon. On the surface of the furniture objects there are representations of flowers, vines, roots, tree trunks and branches, leaves, feathers, dragonfly wings, buds, etc. There are also influences from the styles of Rococo, Gothic and Baroque.

The materials used for the upholstery are precious and with the same themes from nature. Brocade, velvet, silk or linen are used.

The beginning of the First World War represents the end of this bright and lively style. But in the 1960s, with art exhibitions at museums of modern art in the USA, France and England, Art Nouveau was revived and gave birth to psychedelic style and the movement Flower-power.

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