Koloman MoserGerlach's Allegorien Plate #94: "Heads" Lithograph1897
1897
About the Item
- Creator:Koloman Moser (1868 - 1918, Austrian)
- Creation Year:1897
- Dimensions:Height: 13.75 in (34.93 cm)Width: 17.25 in (43.82 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:See "Koloman Moser, Master of Viennese Modernism"by Maria Rennhofer, 2002. Pg 19.
- Gallery Location:Chicago, IL
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU46731426903
Koloman Moser
Born in Vienna in 1868, Koloman Moser briefly attended trade school, honoring his father’s wish to see him in commerce. But he soon surrendered to his artistic inclinations, enrolling in 1885 in Vienna’s Academy of Fine Arts, where he studied painting.
When his father died unexpectedly in 1888, leaving the family in financial straits, Moser (1868–1918) helped out by doing illustrations for books and magazines. Meanwhile, he continued his painting studies, at the academy and then at the School of Arts and Crafts, starting in 1892. That was also the year that Moser, along with other young artists revolting against the Viennese art world’s devotion to naturalism, formed the Siebner Club, the precursor to the Vienna Secession.
Moser’s introduction during his last term at school to Gustav Klimt’s Allegory of Sculpture proved a turning point for the young artist. Christian Witt-Dörring, guest curator of the 2018–19 exhibition “Koloman Moser: Universal Artist between Gustav Klimt and Josef Hoffmann” at the MAK in Vienna, noted a change in the artist’s drawing style. “Primarily inspired by the art of Japan, [Klimt] introduces new paper sizes, fragmented image details, and an emphasis on the line as opposed to the surface,” wrote Witt-Dörring in the exhibition’s catalogue.
A year later, in 1897, Moser together with Klimt, Carl Moll, Joseph Olbrich and Josef Hoffmann founded the Vienna Secession, a union of artists and designers determined to upend Austria’s artistic conservatism. The members were committed to making total works of art: Gesamtkunstwerken. Looking to the English Arts and Crafts Movement, with its guiding principle of unity of the arts, the group attempted to bring art back into everyday life and introduce a local modernism to fin-de-siècle Vienna. Moser, whose membership in the club also afforded him entry into upper-class Viennese society, turned his back on oil painting and forged ahead with Gesamtkunstwerk.
Moser created everything from exhibition design to facade ornamentation for the Secession Building, to graphic materials. Moser also produced posters and advertisements in his “modern style” for various companies. In 1898, he presented his first decor pieces, including hand-knotted rugs and cushion covers. In 1899, Moser began what would become a lifelong professorship at the School of Arts and Crafts. His repertoire now expanded to include furniture, ceramics and patterns like his trademark checkerboard design. He also moved into scenography and fashion and established himself as an interior designer.
The artist decorated his own home in 1902, after which he received a series of important commissions, notably the villa of textile industrialist Fritz Waerndorfer. It was Waerndorfer who provided the financial support that enabled Moser and Hoffmann in 1903 to found the Wiener Werkstätte, a platform for fully realizing their ideal of Gesamtkunstwerk. Two years later, Moser married Edith Mautner von Markhof, the daughter to one of Austria’s great industrial barons, and his work thrived.
In 1907, the Wiener Werkstätte ran into financial trouble. Losing faith in the unity of the arts and disillusioned with the group’s dependency on wealthy patrons like Waerndorfer, Moser left the Werkstätte. He returned to his original discipline, painting, which he continued to practice until his untimely death from cancer, in 1918.
Today, Koloman Moser’s work, from his metal vases to his jewelry to his interiors, remains sought-after and revered. Browse Moser's radically modern creations at 1stDibs.
- ShippingRetrieving quote...Ships From: Chicago, IL
- Return PolicyA return for this item may be initiated within 3 days of delivery.
- Gerlach's Allegorien Plate #44: "Music" LithographBy Koloman MoserLocated in Chicago, ILKoloman Moser (1868 –1918), AUSTRIAN Instead of applying his flair and art education solely to painting, Koloman Moser embodied the idea of Gesamt Kunstwerk (all-embracing art work) by designing architecture, furniture, jewelry, graphics, and tapestries meant to coordinate every detail of an environment. His work transcended the imitative decorative arts of earlier eras and helped to define Modernism for generations to come. Moser achieved a remarkable balance between intellectual structure (often geometric) and hedonistic luxury. Collaborating with Gustav Klimt and Josef Hoffmann, the artist was an editor and active contributor to Ver Sacrum, (Sacred Spring), the journal of the Viennese Secession that was so prized for its aesthetics and high quality production that it was considered a work of art. The magazine featured drawings and designs in the Jugendstil style (Youth) along with literary contributions from distinguished writers from across Europe. It quickly disseminated both the spirit and the style of the Secession. In 1903 Moser and Hoffmann founded and led the Wiener Werkstatte (Viennese Workshop) a collective of artisans that produced elegant decorative arts items, not as industrial prototypes but for the purpose of sale to the public. The plan, as idealistic then as now, was to elevate the lives of consumers by means of beautiful and useful interior surroundings. Moser’s influence has endured throughout the century. His design sensibility is evident from the mid-century modern furniture of the 1950s and ‘60s to the psychedelic rock posters...Category
1890s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsLithograph
- Gerlach's Allegorien Plate #51: "Summer" LithographBy Koloman MoserLocated in Chicago, ILKoloman Moser (1868 –1918), AUSTRIAN Instead of applying his flair and art education solely to painting, Koloman Moser embodied the idea of Gesamt Kunstwerk (all-embracing art w...Category
1890s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsLithograph
- Gerlach's Allegorien Plate #116: "Force, Thirst, Love" LithographBy Carl Otto CzeschkaLocated in Chicago, ILafter Carl Otto Czeschka, (1878-1960), Austrian A leading member of the Vienna Secession and later the Wiener Werkstätte (Viennese Workshop), Carl Otto Czeschka was a vital figu...Category
1890s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsLithograph
- Sema portfolio, 1912, "Male Nude I" Lithograph print 21/215By Egon SchieleLocated in Chicago, ILMALE NUDE (SELF-PORTRAIT) I by Egon Schiele, 1912, a brush and ink lithograph on vellum paper made for the Munich-based artists’ association, Sema 15 Originalsteinzeichnungen portfol...Category
1910s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsLithograph
- Ottokar Mascha Folio, plate 18: "Shaw Oder Die Ironie Poster" by Egon SchieleBy Egon SchieleLocated in Chicago, ILafter EGON SCHIELE (1890-1918) SHAW ODER DIE IRONIE POSTER, C. 1912, (In Mascha, no. 18) Schiele’s poster is an advertisement for a lecture to be given ...Category
1910s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsLithograph
- Gerlach's Allegorien Plate #78: "Hunting" Lithograph by Carl Otto CzeschkaBy Carl Otto CzeschkaLocated in Chicago, ILafter Carl Otto Czeschka, (1878-1960), Austrian A leading member of the Vienna Secession and later the Wiener Werkstätte (Viennese Workshop), Carl Otto Czeschka was a vital figu...Category
1890s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsLithograph
- Der PolsterBy Max KurzweilLocated in New York, NYKurzweil, Maximilian. Der Polster, 1903. Color woodcut on japon. Included as an insert in Pan. Unsigned. Framed.11 1/4 x 10 1/4. 1 Ref: Hofstatter, p. 241; Pabst, p. 154. Maximillian Kurzweil was the co-founder of the Vienna Secession in 1897 and editor and illustrator of the influential Secessionist magazine Ver Sacrum...Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsLithograph
- Mädchen am Fenster. 1906-08.By Oskar KokoschkaLocated in New York, NYMädchen am Fenster. 1906-08. Color lithograph printed on smooth card stock. Full margins. Tipped into a later presentaion folder, signed by the artist in pencil, on the recto. Published by the Wiener Werkstätte, Vienna, with the printed postcard text on verso. Among Kokoschka's earliest prints were a series of 14 postcards, the current work and the following lot that he produced for the Wiener Werkstätte. Wingler/Welz 4. Oskar Kokoschka was an Austrian artist, poet and playwright best known for his intense expressionistic portraits...Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsLithograph
- Original Vintage Secession Poster celebrating the emperor's jubileeLocated in Zurich, CHOriginal Vintage Poster by the Austrian artist Ferdinand Ludwig Graf, a member of the Hagenbund. This Viennese artist association moved as soon a...Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsPaper
- Untitled WoodcutLocated in Wilton, CTOriginal hand-colored woodcut from a portfolio of Secessionist fashion illustrations. Signed in the lower right margin by the artist, Reni Schaschl (1895-1979), a talented member of...Category
1910s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsWoodcut
- FruhlingBy Josef Siccard-RedlLocated in New York, NYSiccard-Redl, Josef. Fruhling, Ca 1910. Color wood engraving, Signed and titled in pencil by the artist. Little is known of this artist other than he worked in Vienna during the ...Category
1910s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsEngraving
- Of Youth —after Gustav Mahler's 'The Song of the Earth'Located in Myrtle Beach, SCArthur Paunzen, 'Von der Jugend' (Of Youth) from the suite 'Song of the Earth', etching, aquatint, and drypoint, 1920. Signed and titled in pencil. Signed in the plate, lower left. A fine, richly-inked impression, on cream, wove Japan paper; the full sheet with margins (2 1/4 to 4 1/4 inches), in good condition. Image size 12 1/4 x 9 1/16 inches; sheet size 19 3/4 x 13 5/8 inches. Matted to museum standards, unframed. ABOUT THIS WORK Pauzen’s suite of six etchings 'Das Lied von der Erde' (The Song of the Earth), published in 1920, was inspired by Gustav Mahler...Category
1920s Vienna Secession Figurative Prints
MaterialsEtching, Drypoint, Aquatint