In yesterday's post we looked at space, so let's go back today on earth with this biodimensional decorative pattern designed by architect and designer Otto Prutscher.
Though created between the late 1800s and the early 1900s, the pattern has an abstract space-like quality about it and makes you think about planets and the universe.
Prutscher was born in 1880 in Vienna and attended the Fachschule für Holzindustrie, entering the Kunstgewerbeschule (School of Applied Arts) in Vienna in 1897, where he studied with Franz von Matsch and Josef Hoffmann. He was strongly influenced by the latter (his early designs borrowed from the Jugendstil style developed by Hoffmann) and by the Secessionist style.
After he finished his studies in 1901, Prutscher focused on designing both buildings and interiors. He designed with Erwin Puchinger interiors in Paris and London, while he also worked on numerous houses and interiors in Vienna and in the provinces.
From 1908 his designs started reflecting an influence of classical forms as shown in the work of this period best exemplified by the marble room created for the Kunstschau in Vienna, executed by craftsworkers of the Wiener Werkstätte.
Prutscher also worked as assistant at the Graphische Lehr-und Versuchsanstalt and, from 1909 at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna (where he taught until 1946).
Architecture-wise after World War I he mainly focused on public housing complexes combining elements of Expressionism and Neue Sachlichkeit, though he was very much into design and the idea of the Gesamtkunstwerk, that is the passion for creating a total environment. This is why he created a wide range of objects – furniture, textiles, jewellery, clocks, glass and ceramic pieces, and leather goods – all of them inspired by art.
He designed for the Wiener Werkstätte, the Deutsche Werkstätten, Augarten, Bakalowits, Chwala, Lobmeyr, Lötz Witwe, Thonet, Ludwig, J.&.J. Hermann, Backhausen, Herburger & Rhomberg and many more.
He also took part in several exhibitions and events, among them the World Exhibition in Paris (1900), the Exhibition for Applied Arts Turin (1902), the Winter-exhibition at the Museum for Art and Industry in Vienna (1911/12) and the Exhibition for Tapestry (1913).
Austria will have a high fashion moment next week as Chanel will host its 2014/15 Métiers d'art collection at the Hotel Schloss Leopoldskron in Salzburg, on 2nd December.
The event is anticipated by a video directed by Karl Lagerfeld entitled "Reincarnation" starring Pharrell Williams and Cara Delevingne as Emperor Franz Joseph I and his wife Elisabeth of Austria (imagine trying to re-do the romantic image of the trilogy of films about Elisabeth directed by Ernst Marischka and starring Romy Schneider in a trashy pop way and you get the final idea...), accompanied by the soundtrack "CC The World," by Williams himself (a track that hides a pun in its title - the logo of the fashion house and the nickname of Elisabeth, Sisi). Though Lagerfeld is very much into art, considering this anticipation and the popular "icons" involved in the video, it is unlikely the designer will be using references such as Otto Prutscher in the collection. We'll discover more in a week, in the meantime, rediscovering or getting to know Prutscher, his architectures and designs, may not be such a bad idea.
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