Week 2:

The Aesthetic
Movement

The History of Interior Design 2

INT262
Instructor: Kieran Mahon
Class reminders/pointers:

- Thurs 18th November - morning visit

- Portal - check it out
- Weekly reading - will be on portal in two weeks
- Essays
- Groups
- This Thursday visit to Leighton House - leave AIU
! at 2pm sharp
 Brief Recap on
Victorian Revivalism
Parthenon, Athens, Greece (431 B.C.)
British Museum (established 1753, present location opened 1857)
Robert Smirke
Engravings by William Gilpin
Strawberry Hill, Twickenham (from 1747)
Horace Walpole et al.
John Ruskin (1819-1900)
A.W.N. Pugin (1812-52)
Salisbury Cathedral, 12th century
Contrasts (1836)
A.W.N. Pugin
New Westminster Palace (Houses of Paliament), 1844-1852
Charles Barry (exterior) and A.W.N. Pugin (interior)
House of Lords
A.W.N. Pugin
Oxford University Museum (1858)
Deane & Woodward
Influenced by John Ruskin. What style is this?
Oxford University Museum
Deane & Woodward, 1858

How is this different to Pugin’s

interiors?
 Week 2:
The Aesthetic Movement,
c.1870 - 1901
The Aesthetic Movement - Overview

- During the 19th c. there were various forms of opposition

to historicism, decorative display and excess in the prevailing
design fashions
- Opposition appeared in various forms - including the
Aesthetic movement and later Arts & Crafts
- Increase in mass consumerism and mass media
(advertising, newspapers & magazines - art is commodified
as well)
The Aesthetic Movement - Overview

- Also known as Aestheticism, Symbolism or Decadence

- A 19th c. movement that emphasised aesthetic values over
moral or social themes in literature, fine art, the decorative
arts and interior design
- A reaction to earlier, more conservative Victorian values
! (eg: Ruskin - more about him next week)
- A loose collection of artists, writers and thinkers adopt the
! motto ‘Art for art’s sake’ (from French l’art pour l’art)
- Preempts aspects of modernism (refined, geometric, lack
! of ornament - towards minimalism)
The Aesthetic Movement - Overview

- Decadent writers followed Walter Pater’s Studies in the

History of the Renaissance (1873), which stated life should be
lived intensely ‘burn always with this hard, gem-like flame’

- Aesthetes held that:

! - The arts should offer sensuous pleasure rather than
! convey moral or sentimental messages
! - Art should not be seen as something moral or useful
! (like Pugin & Ruskin did)
! - Art should not have a didactic (educational) purpose - it
! should just be beautiful
! - Life should imitate art
Some key characteristics of the Aesthetic movement:

- Suggestion rather than sentiment

- Sensuality
- Use of symbols
! (eg flowers: sunflower - infatuation/passion; lilly - purity/
! beauty etc)
- Synaesthetic effects
! (using different senses simultaneously !eg: words, colours
! and music)
Oscar Wilde
(1882)
Other noted aesthetes included:

- Algernon Charles Swinburne (poet)

- James McNeil Whistler (artist)
- Dante Gabriel Rossetti (artist)
- Edward Burne-Jones (artist)
The Aesthetic Movement in the decorative arts:

- Ebonized wood with gilt highlights (wood often stained black)

- Japanese influence (trade with Japan and 1885 Japanese
! Exhibition in Knightsbridge)
- Prominent use of nature (especially flowers, gingko leaves and
! peacock feathers)
- Blue and white design on porcelain and china
Christopher Dresser (1834 - 1901)
Wallpaper designs by Christopher Dresser
Design Work by Christopher Dresser, 1876
Table by Christopher Dresser, c.1872
Table by Christopher Dresser
Teapot by Christopher Dresser, 1879
Edward William Godwin (1833 - 1886)
Ellen Terry
Choosing
G F Watts, 1864
Ellen Terry & daughter Edith Craig
in Japanese influenced costume (Kimono)
Sketches by E.W. Godwin
Sketches by E.W. Godwin
Design by E.W. Godwin
Sketches by E.W. Godwin
Sketches by E.W. Godwin
Sketches by E.W. Godwin
E.W. Godwin
Design for Dromore Castle
c.1869
Godwin furniture made by William Watt
Sold as ‘Art Furniture’, 1877
Features of Anglo-Japanese Style:

Furniture:
! - Simple rectilinear lines
! - Simplification of pattern and motif
! - Value placed on the hand-made
! - Range of materials from expensive ebony to humble paper and
! ! beech

- Ceramics:
! ! - The presence of the hand (hand molding ‘raku’ style)
! ! - Acceptance and celebration of imperfection
! ! - When mass produced style is evoked by vignettes of
! ! ! ! bamboo, paper fans and scenes of Japan
E.W. Godwin
c.1869
E.W. Godwin
Four Seasons Cabinet
c.1877
Dresser by E.W. Godwin, 1877
E.W. Godwin
44 Tite Street, Chelsea
1878-79
E.W. Godwin
44 Tite Street, Chelsea
1878-79
Thomas Jeckyll and James McNeil Whistler
Peacock Room, reassembled in the Freer Gallery of Art in Washington D.C.
Charles Locke Eastlake
Dining Room Sideboard
1874
Next Week...

- Read ch. 5 & 6 of Curtis, Modern Architecture since 1900

- Group 2 presentation on Red House, William Morris and
! Interior Design
- Lecture on the Arts and Crafts Movement