The Life Aesthetic. Josef Hoffmann’s pioneering minimalism

Before aesthete, designer, and architect Josef Hoffmann (1870–1956) came along, Austrian architecture and design was suffocating under a surfeit of opulent ornamentation and bombastic flourish. With his radical new approach and a band of like-minded figures, Hoffmann was a founding father of the Viennese Secession and Wiener Werkstätte and revolutionized Western aesthetics with a brave new minimalism.

This essential introduction explores Hoffmann’s key ideas, projects, and designs to understand his radical aesthetics and their continued influence on European architecture and design, from monochrome interior schemes to the cutlery we put on the table. We explore his integral role at the center of both the Vienna Secession in 1897 and the Wiener Werkstätte, and his commitment to stylistic purity, including some of Europe’s first major modernist buildings, such as the Purkersdorf Sanatorium (1904) and the Palais Stoclet (1905–1911).

The author:

August Sarnitz is a practicing architect and professor of history and theory of architecture at the Akademie der bildenden Künste in Vienna. His many publications include books on R. M. Schindler, Lois Welzenbacher, Ernst Lichtblau, Adolf Loos, and E. A. Plischke.

The editor:

Peter Gössel runs an agency for museum and exhibition design. He has published TASCHEN monographs on Julius Shulman, R. M. Schindler, John Lautner, and Richard Neutra, as well as several titles in the Basic Architecture series.

About the series:

Each book in TASCHEN’s Basic Architecture series features:

- an introduction to the life and work of the architect 
- the major works in chronological order
- information about the clients, architectural preconditions as well as construction problems and resolutions
- a list of all the selected works and a map indicating the locations of the best and most famous buildings
- approximately 120 illustrations (photographs, sketches, drafts, and plans)

An exceptional volume bringing together 1,000 images representing the diversity and richness of the visual arts in Vienna at the turn of the 20th century

At the turn of the 20th century, Vienna became an epicentre for new thought. A multi-disciplinary environment emerged where musicians, writers and intellectuals all flourished, often coming together in the capital’s famous coffee houses. This was the time of Freud and Wittgenstein, of Mahler and Schönberg, and of the Secession (1897–1905), the modern movement led by Gustav Klimt, Josef Hoffmann and Koloman Moser that aimed to bring different arts together in a ‘Gesamtkunstwerk’; of Jugendstil and of the Wiener Werkstätte.

There have been many exhibitions and publications devoted to this effervescence of artistic creation, and even more monographs devoted to its key players. None, however, brings together a selection of visual material from across the different artistic disciplines as significant as this volume, curated and authored by three leading scholars of the period. The illustrations take the lead throughout, creating an invaluable visual reference point for all those eager to identify a given category of the arts within this period, particularly in the field of the decorative arts, from ceramics to glass, silverwork, furniture and jewellery; and graphic arts, from book design to posters and postcards. There are also many less familiar works in the field of fashion and photography, and a particular focus is given to the role of women practitioners of the time.

This is an essential publication for anyone interested in fin-de-siècle Vienna, Viennese art and modern decorative arts more generally.

About the Authors:

Christian Brandstätter is a Viennese author, curator and publisher. Among his previous books is Wonderful Wiener Werkstätte, also published by Thames & Hudson.

Rainer Metzger is an art historian and author who has been a professor at the Kunstakademie Karlsruhe since 2004. His books include Gustav Klimt: Drawings and Watercolours (2005), Berlin in the 20s (2007) and Munich: Its Golden Age of Art and Culture 1890–1920 (2009), all published by Thames & Hudson. 

Daniela Gregori studied Art History in Vienna and Hamburg. As an author and journalist, she works especially in the field of applied arts.

Contents List:

Introduction • 1. The Fine Arts • 2. Painters • 3. The Wiener Werkstätte • 4. Commercial Art and Publications • 5. Glass • 6. Ceramics • 7. Metalwork • 8. Fashion, Textiles and Jewelry • 9. Furniture • 10. Graphic Art and Bookbinding • 11. Photography • 12. Architecture • A–Z of Artists and Manufacturers