Art Nouveau Architecture and Decor: A Historical Lecture

[00:00:00]this is professor lynn porter of fairfield university and this is my lecture on art nouveau architecture and decor these are the various topics i'm going to cover in this lecture starting with when we are and what's going on in the world at the time some of the basic art nouveau concepts and i'm going to give you a little bit of a hint of what came right before art nouveau that kind of kicked off the movement and then we're going to look at the two basic forms that art nouveau is expressed in the curvilinear form and the rectilinear form for curvilinear we're going to look at these uh two different structures the hotel tassel and the castle berger and then furniture in the curvilinear form and then for rectilinear we're going to look at the glasgow school of art hill house or house for an art lover and then furniture in the style as for when we are in the world we're talking about the late 1800s and splashing over for a decade or so into the 1900s so this is a short-lived movement to give you a hint of what the style looks like i have this image this is kind of an iconic nouveau look the paris metro stations were all art nouveau right at the turn of the century in terms of what's going on if we just look first at the industrial developments of this period you see a lot of really big technological changes you have the eiffel tower being the hit at the paris expo it was the tallest man-made structure in the world at the time you have the lumiere brothers making the first motion picture uh mr kodak releases the brownie camera so everyone in america can now take photographs mr marconi is is developing radio technology we have a massive communications cable laid under the pacific ocean so now we can have communications between continents that don't rely on the speed of ships you have the wright brothers quite famously inventing uh sustained heavier than aircraft flight we have the first subway opening in new york at five cents a ride doesn't that sound charming mr ford introducing the model t the first model t's cost less than a thousand dollars and of course we have the titanic making its maiden and only voyage and of course hitting the iceberg in 1912. so this is a period of huge technological uh inspiration and exploration and of course all of this innovation is having an effect on society itself so we're still dealing with the effects of urbanization people are still moving from the country into the cities and the cities are exploding we're putting more power in the hand of consumers which means that there's more demand for more goods and more choices in goods we start having trade and competition becoming truly international and the world itself is being transformed we're going from an agrarian society to an urban and industrial society we're going from handcrafted goods to machine-made goods and we're going from being a producing economy to a consuming economy we're also seeing the balance of power changing across the world britain had been the dominant country of the last couple centuries but their power is declining whereas germany and the united states are becoming new industrial leaders and world leaders and we're still having imperialism around the world so now we're seeing colonies in asia and africa and the pacific and all of this change is causing a profound social anxiety right at the turn of the 20th century so some of the anxiety is pessimistic this is the end of an era and some of the the anxiety is optimistic this is the ability to define a new century and what it means to be modern so we're talking about a world in rapid change technologically socially and causing a lot of of discord in people's hearts so what is art nouveau really about all right let's unpack this it is an international style both in europe and north america and one of the things that's really fascinating about art nouveau it is a conscious attempt to create a brand new style the world is changing it's a brand new century we are going to reject everything that has come before so we're rejecting the idea that if it's historical it has value and now we're trying to find a new visual language this is a style that started in the architecture world and then very quickly moved into the decorative arts so this is a design style that tries to integrate three things the concept of design itself as well as mechanization and the idea of modernity or what it means to be modern so art nouveau is a conscious break from the past up to this point we have seen this kind of pendulum between classicism and then movement away from classicism and then back to classicism nouveau is a conscious choice to move away from any previous style now art nouveau was expressed in two radically different ways one basic way is curvilinear and organic and i've given you three different names for it here i use in this lecture the term art nouveau because that is what it is in this country and also in france but you can see in italy it had a different name in spain a different name but still they're all the basic curvilinear form the other form that art nouveau took was rectilinear and geometric using abstract forms and that was more popular in scotland and scandinavia germany and austria and i must point out that great britain did not have a form of art nouveau they were in the middle of the arts and crafts movement and so they were doing something very different than nouveau at the same time so i want to start by showing you some predecessors of the style in the early 1880s mr mcmurdo published a book about the really famous architect christopher wren and his churches but this is the title page of that book and isn't this fascinating it doesn't look like anything we have seen before right it feels floral and organic and nothing to do with famous churches right another important person at the beginning of the art nouveau movement was aubrey beardsley and here you have the first page of the first volume of a new magazine the studio which was an illustrated magazine of fine and applied art and aubry beardsley was inspired by wood cuts and block prints so you can see that very clear reference in this image as well as the organic line that we become such an important part of the nouveau look i want to share a few other images of aubry beardsley because his particular style was absolutely part of the nouveau look and here you have another illustration but this is for a play um and a costume for a play the peacock skirt for a version of oscar wilde's salome you see those beautiful curvilinear shapes and here's another very famous illustration from the same play right oh how interesting and weird and not at all classical so let's take a look at how this appears in architecture i'm going to share with you two different structures please pardon my french hotel tessell and lu castell bernoulli hotel tassel was designed by victor horta it is a structure in brussels belgium and this is the first building that we can say is an art nouveau structure and here we see in the facade that is stone and iron and glass and it just feels like we're starting to use a different visual language let's take a closer look you see in just this one image where we have this steel beam with the exposed rivets it feels very mechanical doesn't it but then we have beautiful art glass windows i'll show you from the inside how beautiful these windows are and then we have these columns we've never seen columns like this they have these roots almost where they're they're flopping over the base and it feels kind of like they're organic or like they grew there and as we look at this curved front piece of this wonderful hotel we see that everything feels very natural inspired by nature not like anything we've seen classically so so when i say inspired by nature i'm really talking about the curving stems of plants and flowers the curving roots the shapes of leaves and these kinds of curves become iconic to the style here we have just a little grate over a low window so you don't have people kicking in the window and crawling into your basement right it's a very simple functionary piece of grating but when you look at it you see it feels very freehand and free form and has kind of a whiplash feeling to it those same kinds of motifs are repeated in the front door in the left hand image here you can see how that it's a beautiful door but you see there's something special going on in that central panel and the right side of this image is a close-up of that central panel so even just a flat panel has been treated to this feeling of these plants that are emerging out of the wood but where this building really comes into its own is in the interiors you see what i mean this is the main staircase in the lobby where the painting on the wall is is these beautiful whiplash curves that's the that's the phrase we're really looking at here here whiplash curves you have these undulating lines these beautiful graceful sense of flow and everything is asymmetrical very carefully shaped and composed but also asymmetrical here is another shot of that stairwell looking down the stairwell and you see how the tile floor at that base level has these motifs built into the tile you see this these whiplash curves coming up in the actual ironwork of the safety railing and it continues gracefully meandering up the walls and then that window that that art glass stained glass window we saw it from the outside but this is it from the inside so you have this full integration of every space being composed with these beautiful graceful organic shapes so yes this decoration is lavish isn't it but also notice that we're revealing basic architectural structures we have that basic column there holding up a trunk of the ceiling so there's no hiding the fact there's a column there so we still have that revealed column revealed beams with rivets in them that whole sense of mechanization but we've also integrated all of these organic shapes in and around that so everywhere you look in this building you you end up with this unified idea the structure and the decoration and the furniture and the wallpaper and the tiles and the carpets everything should go together everything should be of a piece so so as we look here at this curved section of roof with glass in it that it's it's still part of the overall design we're not starting with a basic rectilinear structure that then we're figuring out how should i paint this wall what kind of a floor treatment do we need no everything has been conceived together it's a very unified building and here we have one last image again of a portion of that lobby area what would it be like to walk into this building for the very first time when you had never seen anything like this what an experience right the other iconic art nouveau structure i wanted to share with you is lucas del beroge in paris this building is not a hotel this is an apartment building with 36 different apartments in it in the left hand image here you see a front elevation of the beautiful front of the building and then the right image is the right side of that same structure let's take a closer look looking at that front facade you see what i mean about asymmetrical very carefully designed very carefully composed very pleasing aesthetically isn't it but breaking all kinds of rules we don't have ionic columns we don't have triangular pediments do we this is a very inventive new thing in architecture and looking closer at that right side view oh how beautiful how pleasing you see areas that come forward areas that recede back you see definite floors within a strong attention to the the skyline and the tops of different areas can you tell that this was inspired by the other building i showed you the hotel let's take a closer look at that front facade here we are standing on the street looking into the center of that facade so first of all take a look at the fence in front of you you see those shapes again you see those whiplash curves you see that color palette that is an iconic nouveau look and this gate leads into a kind of a skinny little courtyard you see how our architect has embraced several different building materials we have bricks we have stone we have concrete we have steel we have that very specific color of blue green there are so many different things that i could unpack here for you but i want to focus in on just one detail just as an example i want to take a look at these windows here let's take a closer look at just at those windows here you go clearly this is a series of windows that is going up an interior staircase so that's where you get this really interesting line happening that's breaking all kinds of rules architecturally the windows are supposed to be lined up with the first floor of the second floor of the third floor but now we're we're putting the windows ascending up the wall just as the stairs ascend up inside the structure but also let's take a look at the the brickwork over the windows over the window openings you have this very specific brick archway we've seen versions of that before but then it just plain stops and it starts over as another one so so instead of continuing down and forming a full arch and then having the next arch take the next space over we're starting to overlap even the the curved portion of an arcade and take a look at that glass work inside the windows doesn't that start to look familiar there we go there is more of that that whiplash curve within the art glass but now now the even the leading is taking on those beautiful forms and obviously you can see several different windows in this image how how those are repeated in multiple windows in the structure this is also a great image of just the various textures that these different building materials have every one of those textures is intentional every one of those colors is very intentional taking a closer look at some of the iron work on the building you see how a it's that same color that we've seen throughout but then we have these moving shapes we have these rivets exposed rivets everywhere that the ironwork crosses you have a big beautiful lumpy rivet going on you see these beautiful weird curved shapes and and organic shapes like is that a leaf is that an animal head is it maybe both i don't know and obviously you have these masks built into the center of the structures when you take a look at the stone work underneath this balcony rail i want to take a moment to consider this bracket here these corbels we've seen lots of corbels holding up lots of things in the last few millennia of this class but notice most of our corbels have tended to be s-shaped or have some kind of volute involved the shape that i'm sketching here in the center of the screen here we don't have that shape at all so again moving away from anything that feels classical so how can we shape a coral to help hold up this balcony oh let's let's go with this interesting geometric but somehow beautifully curved organic shape here we are at the main entrance gate into this building and every single piece of this image is art nouveau you see this curve but it's not exactly a semi-circle you see how the columns are not exactly straight up and down they're they're growing at an angle you see how the columns have these organic shapes they feel like they're growing out of the concrete with these roots and these leaf structures and then just the central gate itself is with this green iron work and all of those beautiful whiplash curves that green and copper thing is a very common feeling to this to the style but even when you look at the stonework above this archway even just this very very lightweight motif that's gently carved into the structure so you still have some areas that are moving forward in space some areas that are moving backwards in space here we are standing inside that anterior room looking at the other side of that gate and even the walls here have a similar kind of organic structure it starts to feel almost like you're moving inside a growing building more of those exposed whiplash curves in the ironwork holding up the ceiling and now we're in that first level of the interior of the lobby and you see that curved archway from the facade repeated here inside and everywhere you look you're going to find those same ideas repeated this is the last image of the structure i want to share with you again taking a look at some of the glass work from the inside stained glass is always more interesting from the inside of a building but you see those repeated curvilinear shapes i hope you can see how we use the word organic to this because it feels kind of like something mother nature did but something that's also very gracefully drawn by a human and if you're going to have an interesting looking structure like the ones i've showed you you also need to have some interesting furniture to go into them so here we have some examples of curvilinear art nouveau side chairs both of which are currently museum pieces but looking at the center splat of the left hand we see all of those shapes we've been talking about already on the right hand image you see how the leather itself has been imprinted with those beautiful nouveau shapes but also just you know this this curve of the leg and this curve of the leg kind of like a wishbone everything feels like it grew here are a few more images of art nouveau chairs yeah check out that back that's about as nouveau as they come remember i was showing you all of those pictures of the castell bermonge this was built to be in that structure by the architect himself this was designed for his office it now lives in virginia in the museum of fine arts but you see how all of those shapes are repeated into the furniture so here we have an entire unified suite for a dining room in the art nouveau style so not only is it the table and the chairs but it's the paneling on the walls that actually seems to grow out and around and form shelf space for beautiful things to be displayed on to form that glass fronted break front where all of the things are displayed on shelves so yeah it's an all-encompassing very organic feeling style but remember i said there was a second form of art nouveau that is rectilinear let's take a look at that we're going to look at the glasgow school of art we're going to look at hill house and we're going to look at house foreign art lover in glasgow starting with the glasgow school of art here we are at the main facade the front entrance of the structure and you can see how we're not finding anything classical here we're finding some other ideas that are expressed more geometrically you see how we have straight lines and we have rectangles but we also have that very graceful attention to detail and really graceful movement as we move closer into this front door in these subsequent images i want you to see how this feels like it's a cousin of the curvilinear forms that we've already been looking at and one of the ways this shows up is in the asymmetry of the building it's rectilinear but still asymmetrical so while this has a strong emphasis on straight lines and rectangular spaces it still has some of that organic feeling to it this is the central medallion over that front door even the font is very specifically designed for the style you see how this feels like a very modern building very consciously choosing how to have structures that jut out from the wall and pull back to the wall this isn't just a cookie cutter every few feet feels the same the entire building has been designed to be a work of art and just as with the curvilinear structures that i've shown you you see a real strong emphasis on the texture of the materials used here you have some nubbly concrete right next to very particularly carved stone work right next to some very carefully rendered iron work with the glass and as we saw with the curvilinear form this also occurs on the inside of the structure here we are in the heart of the library and everything about this room feels like it belongs together the the columns holding up the reading desks the chairs everything feels like it's all been handcrafted and designed to go together and that even extends into the lighting units themselves if you take a really close look at these lighting pieces you see that they repeat the same motifs that we saw on the outside of the building so while this rectilinear style feels radically different from the curvilinear style you still see how they're expressing something modern and something urban and maybe even a little commercial i see that even more in the rectilinear than in the organic style you also see this very close attention to craftsmanship this is art for everybody not just art for the the wealthy people who can afford a beautiful painting or a portrait painter to come in this is art to be enjoyed by anyone who can be in this room so while the glasgow school of art feels kind of like a warehouse or an industrial building it that's intentional this entire building is forward-looking it's looking at urbanization it's looking at commercialization but it's also leaning back on those late eighteen hundreds ideals of hand-crafted art here's another example of iconic rectilinear art nouveau architecture hill house again everything about this structure is forward-looking it's turning away from anything historically associated with architecture here we are coming up on the front facade of the building and you see how it's unique we haven't seen anything like this shape or this structure in this lecture before and that's part of the art nouveau thing every designer has his or her style and it is unique to that person so the art nouveau thing was also about the individuality of the designer here we are inside that front hallway of that building and again everything feels like it was intentionally designed together look at that carpet look at that chair look at that table look at that lighting unit look at the wall paneling look at the color and the shapes of the beams in the ceiling all of it is designed together and now we're in the drawing room of hill house and this feels like no other drawing room we have looked at in this entire semester you see how it feels very modern very forward-looking you see how that carpet is connected to the carpet in the front hallway you see how the the pattern on the walls is connected down into the furniture itself you see how the tile work on the front of the fireplace is integrated into the entire room again in that gently curved niche you see a lot of very flat planes but then you also see these gently curved protrusions and and niches and i love this image look at that individually designed wallpaper right next to the lighting unit that was also individually designed so the motifs from the wallpaper and the lighting unit they're absolutely integrated together and the last building i want to show you is called house for an art lover by charles rennie mcintosh and his wife margaret mcdonald macintosh and this rectilinear art nouveau style is sometimes called macintosh style it's so closely associated with these two designers so this is the macintosh drawing of what the reception and music room would look like in this house this is a drawing from 1901 and this house was conceived as part of a competition they designed this for a german design magazine that that put out a call to all architects we want you to design a special house is for art lovers they entered these drawings into the competition they were disqualified because they got the materials in a little bit late but even so they were awarded a prize because this style itself was so distinct and unique to the macintoshes but in the 1990s based on those original drawings the building was actually built in scotland because macintosh had become such a great uh iconic character and style they wanted to actually bring this structure to life so no one has ever lived in this building it was built as as a museum basically with with the goal to promote the idea of art and design and architecture and i gotta say you know this building was built in the night it was opened in the 1990s but it feels still very forward-looking even though it was designed a century earlier pretty amazing huh taking a look at some of the rectilinear art nouveau furniture here you have several macintosh chairs and you can see this isn't about comfort but it is about those straight lines that about that beautiful attention to detail about finding the idea of chair that has never existed before here are two other macintosh chairs these feel very much like they would fit inside that library within that school of art in glasgow don't they and i think it's pretty easy to see why this is called a rectilinear form right and these are three macintosh chairs also these are called the ingram chairs because they were designed specifically for the ingram tea room but these fill feel very much to me like the papa bear mama bear baby bear chairs but we still have those very strong rectilinear lines we have that repeated motif of the small squares you can see how this furniture feels very much like it belongs in some of these rectilinear structures so that's what i wanted to share with you about the art nouveau style thank you for your time