Varnedoe Kirk. Vienna 1900: Art, Architecture & Design

Museum of Modern Art, 1986. — 272 p.Before World War I, Vienna was not
only the governing capital of a vast
empire but also the intellectual and
artistic huh of Central Europe. In the
music of Gustav Mahler and Arnold
Schonberg, in Sigmund Freud's psy
choanalytic studies, in the philosophy
of Ludwig Wittgenstein, and in many
other areas, this cosmopolitan city
became a crucial site for the forma
tion of modem culture. The visual
arts were a central part of Vienna's
"golden age." Beginning with the
formation of the Vienna Secession in
1897, artists, architects, and designers
worked, often in close collaboration,
toward a vocabulary of radically new
forms that would body forth the spirit
of a new age. In this endeavor they
brought to bear a special sensibility, in
part reflective of Vienna's special
place on the border between Western
and Eastern Europe.
Published in conjunction with
an exhibition at The Museum of Modern
Art, this book offers a compelling
overview of all the visual arts of early
modem Vienna. The work of the
major creators is discussed in detail:
in painting, Gustav Klimt and the
young expressionists Oskar Kokoschka
and Egon Schiele; in archi
tecture, the pioneering Otto Wagner
and the rival early modernists Josef
Hoffmann and Adolf Loos; and in
design, Koloman Moser, Carl Otto
Czeschka, and other members of the
Wiener Werkstatte. Mixing images
from the period with splendid new
photography, the numerous illustra
tions follow the work of these and
other Viennese artists through a
striking series of stylistic changes —
from the ornate decorativeness of the
turn of the century through a phase of
strict, geometric reduction, to the
emergence of modem stylizations.
Not only painting, drawing, and
architecture, but also furniture, glass,
ceramics, silverware, fashion, jewelry,
and graphic design are generously
represented.
Kirk Vamedoe's text synthesizes
many of the new insights that have
stemmed from the remarkable surge
of intellectual and popular interest in
tum-of-the-century Vienna since the
1960s. Taking into account modem
and postmodern assessments of
Vienna's arts, he offers a fresh critical
evaluation. The rich, complex, and
often problematic legacy of a unique
time and place is arrestingly set forth
in word and image, and considered in
relation to the broader currents of
early modem art.