Interior Design: Introduction

Interior Design

Exemplified by the geometric designs of famous New York buildings such as the Chrysler Building and Rockefeller Center, Art Deco was the most fashionable international design movement in modern art from 1925 until the 1940s.

Like the earlier Arts and Crafts Movement, as well as the curve linear style of design known as Art Nouveau, as well as the German Bauhaus design school concept, Art Deco embraced all types of art, including crafts as well as fine arts. It was applied to decorative art like interior design, furniture, jewellery, textiles, fashion and industrial design, as well as to the applied art of architecture and the visual arts of painting, and graphics.

The art deco style, which above all reflected modern technology, was characterized by smooth lines, geometric shapes, streamlined forms and bright, sometimes garish colors. Initially a luxury style (a reaction against the austerity imposed by World War I) employing costly materials like silver, crystal, ivory, jade and lacquer, after the Depression it also used cheaper and mass-produced materials like chrome, plastics, and other industrial items catering to the growing middle class taste for a design style that was elegant, glamorous and functional.

Note : For other art and design movements similar to Art Deco, see Art Movements, Periods, Schools (from about 100 BCE).

Origin of Art Deco

The word art deco derives from the 1925 Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs Industriels et Modernes, held in Paris. The show was organized by an association of French artists known as, La Societe des Artistes Decorateurs (society of decorator artists), led by its founders Hector Guimard (1867-1942), Eugene Grasset, Raoul Lachenal, Paul Follot, Maurice Dufrene, and Emile Decour, some of whom were previously involved in Art Nouveau. Note however that the term Art Deco was not widely used until popularized by the art historian and critic Bevis Hillier in her book Art Deco of the 20s and 30s (1968).

History

Art Deco owed something to several of the major art styles of the early 20th century. These formative influences include the geometric forms of Cubism (note: Art Deco has been called "Cubism Tamed"), the machine-style forms of Constructivism and Futurism, and the unifying approach of Art Nouveau. Its highly intense colours may have stemmed from Parisian Fauvism. Art Deco borrowed also from Aztec and Egyptian art, as well as from Classical Antiquity. Unlike its earlier counterpart Art Nouveau, however, Art Deco had no philosophical basis it was purely decorative.

The Art Deco style, adopted by architects and designers around the world, spanned the "Roaring Twenties", the Great Depression of the early 1930s, and the years leading up to the Second World War. It suffered a decline in popularity during the late 30s and early 40s, when it began to be seen as too gaudy and ostentatious for wartime austerity, after which it quickly fell out of fashion. The first resurgence of interest in Art Deco occurred in the 1960s coincident with the movement's affect on Pop Art and then again in the 1980s, in line with growing interest in graphic design. The style appeared in a number of jewellery and fashion ads.