Art Nouveau

Between 1890 and 1910, a popular style in many European countries was the Art Nouveau, in French, “new art”. The Art Nouveau was inspired by nature, and its artists used organic and curved lines with bright colors.

The idea was to transform their work in a living thing.

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The artists created every kind of thing, like paintings, sculptures, jewelry, fabrics and other “every day objects”, even buildings!

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Two famous architects representative of this style were Antoni Gaudì from Barcelona and  Hector Guimard from Paris.

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Gaudì has designed a lot of buildings, like “Casa Mila”, his most famous work and Guimard has designed a lot of entrances for the Parisian metro. 

In the USA, Tiffany Louis created glass and ceramics works (well known is the Tiffany glass lamp) in the Art’s Nouveau style.

He also created necklaces and brooches in the form of insects, animals and flowers. At last, Tiffany projected his fathers jewelry.

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At London, there was Liberty, a company that produced commercial Art Nouveau products. In the 1890’s, the owner of the company of that time commissioned new Art Nouveau patterns for the store’s fabrics. “Liberty print” is still famous today all around the world.

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Britain’s most famous Art Nouveau designer, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, studied at the Glasgow School of Art. He designed houses, a famous tea room in Glasgow’s city centre and a new building for the academy where he studied.

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Art Nouveau was revived many times during the 20th century.