"To Each Age It's Art, To Art It's Freedom"

February 9th lecture focused on the Art Nouveau period. Even though the art influence only had a 20 year life span, artist contributed quite a bit in to this period. New forms were invented and ornamentation became structural. Visually the art is linear with textural and color areas. The concept made the art appear apart of everyday life. In the beginning the art seemed rather unusual having a fantasy like quality and was often used as poetic imagery. Women were often used in the art which created a motif creating an idealized beauty. Artists expanted their abilities by limited the art visually. One style was the 'Coloring Book Style' which consisted of thick, black outlines which totally completed the form.

Later artist decided to challenge the mind of viewers creating flat color and sharp silhouettes, allowing the viewer to mentally complete the imagery or story themselves. Backgrounds were later eliminated so the viewer could focus on the neccesary points. A major movement of this time period was the Jugendstil movement. Jugen meaning youth, and stil meaning movement. This movement took fantasy a step further by using non-traditional forms to stress commodity, culture, and alientation. The Secession movement was a clash between traditional and new ideas. Art Nouveau didn't stop there however. Artist broke away from floral patterns creating mathamatical patterns using geometric shapes.

For such a short time period, Art Nouveau influenced a great deal of artists. I haven't quite decided yet how I feel about the art. I'm mixed between liking it and hating it. I believe I'm more fond of the visually constricted art. The pieces that let the eye and mind complete the image for itself. I believe that is a major leap for design because each viewer has their own interpretation. In another class I have someone can have a different personal interpretation than another based on their experience. I've never been good with geometry but it seems the world continues to try to make sense of the world though patterns. Like the continuous spiral that never seems to end and goes on forever. Artist will always try to touch the world with their new discoveries. Discoveries aren't something that should be kept but shared.