Art Nouveau 1890-1910 Walking into an Art Nouveau interior is like entering a fantasy—it elicits a smile, and a sense of escape from reality, enticing the eye with exuberant celebrations of thewhiplash curve that painter William Hogarth(1697-1764 called the “line of beauty” . The style is created by more than merely furnishings’ in effect, the entire room is designed as part of an ensemble that early German modernists called “gesamtkunstwerk,” or total work of art. The vertical and horizontal planes of walls and ceilings seem to dissolve into asymmetrical curves and undulating surfaces, transforming the shell of the room into a sculptural surround. Carved paneling might frame a wallpapers patterned with stylized flowers, foliage, or Japanese motifs on pale graounds. Elaborate iron staircases resemble tendrils and vines, and the fireplace is framed in decorative tiles. Window treatments are relatively uncomplicated, with shaped pelmets hung over draperies patterned with stylized floral motifs. Upholstery fabrics use the same stylized motifs, embroidered on linen, silk, or wool—many by celebrated Art Nouveau designers. Colors in the Art Nouveau interior seem luminescent; intense pastels like lilace and mauve, salmon, and indigo enhance the effedt of a room enveloped in pattern; Lighting elements using gas, kerosene or, now, electricity, are organic forms, frequently of brass or brilliant colored Tiffany lamps and fixtures. On the walls, paintings, prints, perhaps Japanese wood blocks, on tabletops and mantels, many small objects of ceramic, silver, and pewter. Glass art ware would include objects by the Galle or Daum firms. Much Art Nouveau furniture is unmistakable in its exaggerated curves and flowing ornament. The overall effect is one of lightness and delicacy, in part due to the finely executed ornament, but also from the use of a variety of decoratively grained, light-toned wood.
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