Reconsidering the Geometric Style of Austrian Jugendstil

Vienna Workshops' Designs of the Early 1900s

Abstract

This paper sheds new light on Modern Design in Vienna around 1900 by exploring the background of Vienna Workshops' (1903-1932) early geometric designs.
Activities of the Workshops were connected to the Secession, the fin-de-siecle art movement in Vienna, which searched for new and relevant ways of expression and strove to realize a "total art", partly for political reasons. The Workshops' simple designs reflect the ideals of the crafts movement in Europe, criticism of eclectic historicism, and closeness to the Biedermeier, the idealized vernacular style.