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From: Jessica M. Dandona <jdandonamcad.edu>
Date: Jun 25, 2015
Subject: CFP: New Perspectives on Art Nouveau and Fin-de-Siecle Design

New Perspectives on Art Nouveau and Fin-de-Siècle Design (Design Studies Forum Short Session)

Peter Clericuzio, The Wolfsonian–Florida International University, clericuzgmail.com
Jessica M. Dandona, Minneapolis College of Art and Design, jdandonamcad.edu

Much of our understanding of Art Nouveau rests on several well-known aspects of its history: its simultaneous appearance around 1890 in several renowned centers of Western art, its ties to nationalism, its complicated relationship with technology and the crafts, and its swift and certain death before the First World War. Recent scholarship, however, has begun to probe Art Nouveau from other angles, focusing on its appearance in unexpected places, its association with colonial enterprises, and its mass appeal. We invite papers that extend such new perspectives or provide surprising and alternative avenues of investigation into turn-of-the-century design, exploring its origins, dissemination, influence, and eventual demise. Did other cities or regions, such as Latin America, Eastern Europe, Africa, or the Middle East, nurture their own distinctive strands of Art Nouveau? Should we investigate the global connections between its practitioners more carefully instead of its national strands? What alternative political meanings did Art Nouveau disclose while it lasted? Was progressive design of this era merely the fashionable preserve of a bourgeois, educated class, or did it also carry currency with working-class audiences? Did Art Nouveau’s association with the “feminine” reinforce existing conceptions of gender, or did it suggest new ideas about the role of the sexes in fin-de-siècle society? What impact did scientific discoveries have on the understanding of Art Nouveau and its relationship with nature? Other new interpretations of fin-de-siècle design and its many faces are welcome.

Please send a one-page abstract, a letter explaining your interest in the session, and a brief CV with your email, mailing address and phone number to both session co-chairs.

Deadline for submitting abstracts is 15 August 2015.
Applicants will be notified by 1 October 2015.
Full texts of papers will be due to session chairs by 1 December 2015.