Author Description

Jane Kallir's comprehensive work not only charts the rise, flowering and decay of the Wiener Werkstatte, but assesses its extraordinary artistic achievements in every branch of design. In doing so, the author analyzes for the first time the dense web of connections―institutional and educational, intellectual and social―that enabled the imaginative leaders of the Werkstatte to impress upon the Austrian elite and the world beyond their visual ideals and stylistic idiom. ―Carl E. Schorske At the turn of the twentieth century, Vienna emerged as a great cultural centre that stood at the forefront of developments in music, psychology, and the natural sciences. Equally influential, and still tremendously popular today, are the designs of the Wiener Werkstatte, or Vienna Workshop, a group that was at the heart of the city's cultural scene and whose collaborators included such luminaries as the architect Josef Hoffman, the designer Koloman Moser, and the painters Gustav Klimt, Oskar Kokoschka, and Egon Schiele. This guide to the arts and crafts of fin-de-siecle Vienna is an excellent introduction to their work in all media - from architecture, furniture, ceramics, and glass, to silver, fashion, and textiles, bookbinding, toys, painting, and the graphic arts - as well as a survey of the cultural development of this pivotal period. 55 color plates and 195 black & white illustrations