Brave Nouveau World
Gustav Klimt's Cohorts Made Both Art and Fabulous Fabric
Jennifer Barger
Express
Friday, Aug. 10, 2007
When Gustav Klimt's "Portrait of Adele Bloch Bauer II" was auctioned off last year in New York, the dreamy image of an Art Nouveau babe in a gilded, peacock-print own captured a record $135 million.
Klimt's lush paintings of figures in posh patchwork robes and frocks remain the best-known, flashiest remainder of turn-of-the-last-century Vienna. But his compatriots at the Wiener Werkstatte and the Secession (two artistic collectives) were also known for their metalwork, architecture and fabric.
Their material whirls -- colorful silks and cottons in prints at once modern and retro -- star in the new exhibit "Textiles of Klimt's Vienna," which opened last week at the Textile Museum.
Displayed mostly in simple black frames, 58 fabric samples show off a range of influences and hues -- think the early 20th century's answer to Marimekko. Artist Dagobert Peche put fuzzy stripes of brown and blue on silk, forming a surreal sunset. Maria Likarz-Strauss set cobalt and yellow flowers against an inky background on one exuberant cotton.
Secessionists and Werkstatters believed that objects, furniture and fashion should be created in harmonious styles, bringing a cohesive artiness to one's surroundings. This means the collectives' fabrics got whipped up into evening gowns, lampshades and curtains. One photo catches Klimt himself duded out for a 1913 party in a patterned kaftan and what appears to be a hat made of a breadbasket.
Other sketches and photographs give more clues as to how these fabrics were used. A watercolor-like blue-and-purple textile by Peche became a cape and bloomer outfit Klimt captured in one of his portraits.
Josef Hoffman's black and gray geometric pattern, which brings to mind the Art Deco craze to come, upholstered armchairs in a Vienna sanatorium. There's even a swatch book of Peche's designs, which are so groovy-looking that Pottery Barn ought to see about reproducing them on sofas.
In a way, these are just scraps. But since they're from such a decadent, artful era, these textiles conjure chic gatherings and decked-out rooms in long-ago Vienna. It's swell to get a glimpse of the party.
Vienna was an exciting place to be, circa 1910. Sigmund Freud was spouting off on sex, Arnold Schoenberg was inventing a new way of making music, and Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele were embracing a new modern art. Things were just as vibrant in design, thanks to Josef Hoffmann and Koloman Moser and their recently founded Wiener Werkstaette ("Vienna Workshop") for the decorative arts. A little survey called "Textiles of Klimt's Vienna," at the Textile Museum, presents what the Werkstaette came up with in fabric design -- patterns more exotic and geometric and simply out there than almost anyone had tried before.
-- Blake Gopnik (Aug. 12, 2007)
