From the Chrysler to the Weston: 100 years of Art Deco

Picture the scene: the 1920s, jazz and sequins are stealing onto the dance floor. On the gallery wall, new techno-infused modernist forms are weaving their way into post-war aesthetics. In France, Paris breathes a sigh of relief in the aftermath of German occupation. In this atmosphere of Parisian liberty, Gertrude Stein penned: โ€œit is not what Paris gives you, it is what she does not take away.โ€ Yet behind this, anxieties were bubbling about what France had to give modern global culture. โ€œEven the Americans themselves reacted, and sought to create for themselves โ€“ for better or worse โ€“ an original artโ€ wrote Minister of Commerce Lucien Dior: โ€œduring this what did we doโ€ฆ? Nothing, except copy our own old-fashioned styles.โ€ Out of this insecurity, not without an air of competition, the 1925 International Exposition of Modern Industrial and Decorative Arts was unveiled in Paris. This was the birth of Art Deco, a gift that would redesign the world.

The expositionโ€™s fundamental stipulation was that everything be exclusively modern. It was expected, though, that this modernity should embrace the extravagant optimism of the period. Beyond the thirteen opulently designed entrances, the exposition was organised by pavilions, each competitively garnished to display the artistic creations of different French products, regions, and territories, as well as each of the international pavilions. These were accompanied by merry go rounds, fireworks, 300 ballerinas, andโ€”to illuminate the Eiffel Towerโ€”two hundred thousand light bulbs in six colours. So when Le Corbusier revealed his Pavillon de l’Esprit Nouveau (ascetic, grey, and furnished only by mass-produced furniture and his designs for Plan Voisin), organisers of the exposition, horrified, attempted to conceal the shameful offering behind fences.

Both a development of and opposition to the Art Nouveau style, Art Deco is distinct for its incorporation of cubist elements which instill an angular, geometric quality. Art Deco is found in the visual arts, architecture, and commercial product design from furniture to fashionโ€”parker pens and streamlined locomotives. Its influence looming large in cities across the globe: construction for the Chrysler Building, an iconic feature of New Yorkโ€™s skyline, began in 1929. Three years later, Christ the Redeemer was completed in Brazil, and has gazed down at Rio de Janeiro ever since. When thinking of Art Deco, Oxford is far from the first city that springs to mind. However, at the heart of the University, the Weston Library offers a local example of Art Deco architecture, designed in 1934 by Sir Giles Gilbert Scottโ€”and thatโ€™s without mentioning the books within Oxfordโ€™s libraries. Iconic covers including the Celestial Eyes dust jacket of F. Scott Fitzgeraldโ€™s The Great Gatsby or (love it or loathe it) the cover art of multiple editions of Ayn Randโ€™s Atlas Shrugged exemplify Art Deco from Oxfordโ€™s bookshelves.

Return to war in 1939 would bring a sharp end to the lavish tastes and garish embellishments of Art Deco, but even before this, modernism was creeping in. Despite Art Deco interior designer Paul Folletโ€™s claims that โ€œthe superfluous is always neededโ€, architectural decadence could not be justified in the face of the Great Depression of the 1930s and material wartime need of the following decade. Against this backdrop, Le Corbusier’s modernist counterclaim that the house was merely โ€œa machine to live inโ€ aligned more concretely with the modern world, while Art Decoโ€™s geometric extravagances left the style more fragmented from reality than ever. โ€œDecorative art,โ€ Le Corbusier wrote, โ€œas opposed to the machine phenomenon, is the final twitch of the old manual mode, and is a dying thing.โ€
This year, 100 years after the revolutionary advent of Art Deco, Parisโ€™ Musรฉe des Arts Dรฉcoratifs will launch an exhibition reflecting on the 1925 International Exposition of Modern Industrial and Decorative Arts. One cannot help but wonder whether such a return to the past is the best way to mark the spirit of modernity that precipitated the Art Deco style. Will 2025 begin an era of retrospection, and not growth? In answer to this, it is important to consider the cycle of progress, and how vital the past is in the influence of the future. As Frantz Jourdain, member of the Society of Decorative Artists, said of his 1925 inspiration: โ€œwe consequently resolved to return Decorative Art, inconsiderately treated as a Cinderella or poor relation allowed to eat with the servants, to the importantโ€ฆ place it occupied in the past.โ€ This month, the first of 2025, marks both a centenary of the past and the beginning of a new year; perhaps modernity allows for both.

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