Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau is an international art movement and style based on organic forms. It was seen in art, graphic design, architecture and applied arts such as decoration, jewelry, ceramics and glass. and continued until the First World War. 

Art Nouveau is organic in style. It has floral and plant-inspired motifs, and stylized, flowing curvilinear forms. Art Nouveau is an approach to design according to which artists should work on everything from architecture to furniture, making art part of everyday life.
The movement was strongly influenced by artist Alphonse Mucha.

 Art Nouveau monuments are now recognized by UNESCO on their World Heritage Sites list as significant contributions to cultural heritage. The historic center of Latvia, with "the finest collection of art nouveau buildings in Europe", was inscribed on the list in 1997 in part because of the "quality and the quantity of its Art Nouveau architecture". Four Brussels town houses by Victor Horta were included in 2000 as "works of human creative genius" that are "outstanding examples of Art Nouveau architecture brilliantly illustrating the transition from the 19th to the 20th century in art, thought, and society".


One characterization of this art movement was

pictures of flowers and vines, also called foliate forms. Many of these forms were used in mixtures.

In Barcelona, two men named Antonio Gaudi and Josep Jujol worked to produce beautiful ceramic montages. They used a technique known as trencadis in which tiles covered surfaces of buildings. They also fused broken dishes and other found objects such as broken china dolls, which was a revolutionary idea in art and architecture.