Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau

Appearing in the early 1880s, Art Nouveau was a response to the technological advances following the Industrial Revolution and the radical changes caused by the rapid urban growth. It was said that Art Nouveau was actually considered the first stage of the development of modern architecture in Europe. This movement strongly reacted against the Beaux-Arts classicism movement. The intentions of the Art Nouveau artists was to capture and combine the airiness and lightness of glass and metal construction, along with environmental inspirations. Most believe that Art Nouveau first began with graphics and decorative arts. The most prevalent architects that helped sculpt the new movement and familiarize others to this new art were Victor Horta, Henry Van der Velde, and Hector Guimard.

Interior View of Hotel Tassel

Victor Horta made his architecture known as a three-dimensional equivalent to the painters’ two-dimensional linear creativity. Horta began his career by studying both art and architecture at his local academy in Belgium. His first projects included house designs in Brussels. He then constructed the Hotel Tassel in 1892, which was known for its “synthesis of architecture and the decorative arts and it declaration of new formal principles.”

Like Viollet-le-Duc, Horta was inspired by natural forms in which he used for metal ornament, while also emphasizing direct use of modern materials. He sensed his feelings of natural forms along with foreign and fresh ideas.

As Victor Horta grew older, he rarely achieved his freshness. This made an opening for the introduction of another Belgian artist to continue the style into the twentieth century. Henry Van der Velde carried on this new movement with his more theoretical turn of mind. Before architecture, Van der Velde was a painter and was influenced by Impressionists, social-realism imagery, and the paintings of Gauguin. He believed that Art Nouveau designers aim for their projects to be “the total work of art,” meaning that everything in the building would have the same visual characteristics as the building itself.

Castel Beranger- Gate Detail

As the word of the new movement spread, it finally made its way to France where Hector Guimard introduced designs for the Paris Metro in 1900. He used natural forms to create arches and iron furnishings, much like Viollet-le-Duc’s Gothic Rationalism. Guimard attempted to reinterpret this movement in his own personal way. In the Paris Metro he made use of delightful curvature of naturalistic forms for the entrance. He first experimented the new style in his design of the Castel Beranger in Paris, France.

Guimard's Paris Metro

These three designers helped to make Art Nouveau more than a change in architectural dress, and more than just a system of decoration. Each artist attempted to represent a social vision and enhance the establishment he built, and builders in the future, in his own way. Architectures anatomy and spatial character was greatly transformed due to these three men.