Art Nouveau is a French term which literally means New Art. Art Nouveau was a movement that developed and was popular between the 1880s and the 1910s in opposition to the traditional academic and historical emphasis which was placed on art in the mid-19th century.
It attempted to eliminate the distinction between the major and minor arts, between fine arts and applied arts.
Art Nouveau is not only a style it is a way of thinking about society and the nature of art. Art Nouveau is an approach to art in which the artist should not overlook any everyday object, from architecture to furniture art is a part of the everyday life. The Art Nouveau approach has been used with buildings and architecture, furniture, glassware, book design and illustration, graphic design, jewelry, pottery, metalwork, textiles painting and sculpture.
Art Nouveau has a decorative style and dedication to natural, organic forms especially plant, leaf, vine and floral inspired motifs, and highly stylized, dramatic curving lines. The movement had its basis in Romanticism, High Victorian Style, Rococo, Symbolism, and Japanese art, as well as Arts and Crafts design from Great Britain.
The Art Nouveau movement was a response to the Industrial Revolution and was an attempt to create an international style based on decoration appropriate for the modern society. Some artists of the time welcomed the new technologies and accepted the use of new materials and mass producing pieces while others were concerned with high quality craftsmanship as a way of advancing the status of the decorative arts movement.
The Art Nouveau style didn’t last beyond WWI when it trailed off and was replaced by Art Deco and the 20th century modernist styles.
Influential and leading Art Nouveau artists included Alphonse Mucha, Rennie Mackintosh, Aubrey Beardsley, Gustav Klimt, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Edvard Munch, and Louis Comfort Tiffany.
