Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau: Art, Architecture and Design in Transformation presents a new overview of the international Art Nouveau movement. Art Nouveau, Charlotte Ashby argues, represented the search for a new style for a new age, and hence a response to the conditions of modernity, in a world transformed by developments such as industrialisation, the growth of new cities, and the movements of populations into these cities, bringing about new ways of living, working and making that were felt to be fundamentally different to what had gone before. The book is structured around key themes for understanding the aesthetics and contexts of Art Nouveau, including form and ornament, symbolism and psychology, new forms of transport and communication, colonialism and imperialism, the rise of the 'modern woman' and the role of the patron-collector and the professional designer. Ashby explores the movement through 65 varied case studies of architecture, interiors, paintings, furniture, graphic arts, glass and ceramics by artists and designers, drawn from eighteen countries from a wide range of countries.