Modern Taste. Art Deco in Paris, 1910-1935

09/04/2015. Exhibition at Juan March Foundation. [MAD] Spain 26/03/15 > 28/06/15
metalocus, SILVIA BATRES

For the first time in Spain, the Juan March Foundation presents an exhibition about the so-called "last overall style" of history, art deco. The exhibition brings us more than three hundred fifty pieces of very different kinds, from paintings to magazines through perfume among others. It combines reconstructions and recreations that testify to the modern taste and air of a time as hard to grasp as present in our contemporary culture time.

Modern Taste. Art Deco in París, 1910-1935: exposition at the Fundación Juan March, Madrid. Photograph © Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Modern Taste. Art Deco in París, 1910-1935: exposition at the Fundación Juan March, Madrid. Photograph © Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Boquilla Trompette, 1928. Cartier París. Platinum and gold, pink diamonds carving, calibrated emeralds carving, jet and coral. Photograph © Nils Herrmann. Cartier Collection. Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

SillónLC7, 1929. Charlotte Perriand. Chromium-plated steel, lacquer and leather. Photograph © F.L.C./ADAGP,Paris/CNAP. C.Devleeschauwer. Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Reja Diana, 1924. Edgar-William Brandt. Forged iron and bronze with patina. Musée d'art et d'histoire, Ville de Genève, Ginebra. Photograph © Musée d'art et d'histoire, Ville de Genève, Geneva. Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Los vestidos de Paul Poiret vistos por Georges Lepape, 1911. Georges Lepape. Lighted pochoir, on paper. Photograph © Victoria and Albert Museum, Londres. Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Escritorio de dama con decoración de peces, 1940. Jean Dunand. Lacquer and painted egg shells. Collections du Mobilier national, Paris. Photograph © Isabelle Bideau. Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Madame Agnès, 1925-26. Jean Dunand. Lighted silver gelatin with gouache and applications of gold and silver leaf. Courtesy Galerie Michel Giraud, Paris. Photograph © Courtesy Galerie Michel Giraud, París. Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Vestido de noche Chimère, 1925. Jeanne Paquin. Blue silk and gold embroidered with Chinese dragons motifs and applications of beads, pearl and golden beads. Photograph © Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Simone Kahn, 1926. Man Ray. Silver gelatin. Posthumously reproduction of 1978. Galería Manuel Barbié. Colection Manuel Barbié-Nogares, Barcelona. Photograph © Galería Manuel Barbié, Barcelona. Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Mowgli. Raymond Delamarre. Photograph © Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Transatlantico Normandie: vista de interior del gran salón, 1933-34. Roger-Henri Expert y Richard Bouwens van der Boijen. Gouache and watercolor on paper. Académie d'architecture/Cité de l'architecture et du patrimoine/Archives d'architecture du XXe siècle, París. Photograph © Académie d'architecture/Cité de l'architecture et du patrimoine/Archives d'architecture du XXe siècle, Paris. Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

Modern Taste. Art Deco in París, 1910-1935: exhibition at the Fundación Juan March, Madrid. Photograph © Courtesy of Fundación Juan March

Modern Taste. Art Deco in París, 1910-1935: exhibition at the Fundación Juan March, Madrid. Photograph © Courtesy of Fundación Juan March.

The exhibition Modern Taste. Art Deco in Paris, 1910-1935 will be on display in Madrid at the Fundación Juan March between 26 March and 28 June. It aims to offer visitors the chance to learn about, enjoy and appreciate what has been termed “the last total style” in history: the hard-to-define Art Deco. This is the first exhibition on the subject to be held in Spain and the first outside a multi-collection or decorative arts museum, given that the Juan March is an institution with an exhibition programme focused essentially on modern art.

The style now known as Art Deco was an alternative to the avant-garde, implying a modernism that was more pragmatic and ornamental than utopian and functionalist. Eventually it became the great style of the modern taste and aspirations that were so characteristic of western societies and capitalism in the early decades of the 20th century.

Organization.-

Modern Taste. Art Deco in Paris, 1910-1935 is structured into eight chronological and thematic sections which together narrate a phenomenon that is as fascinating at it is unknown. Including more than 350 examples of painting, sculpture, furniture, fashion, jewellery, perfumery, film, architecture, stained-glass, ceramics, lacquer and goldsmith’s work in addition to textiles, book-bindings, photographs, drawings, plans, architectural models, advertising posters and magazines, the exhibition combines reconstructions and recreations that reveal the modern taste and the atmosphere of a period that is both extremely difficult to capture but also notably present in contemporary culture.

Modern Taste. Art Deco in Paris, 1910-1935 also focuses on the presence of the exotic in Art Deco, particularly in relation to the Colonial Exhibition held in Paris in 1931. It continues up to the 1930s when the style’s distinctive modernity combined and fused with the new forms evolved by Charlotte Perriand, Le Corbusier and Eileen Grey that are habitually identified with Modernism, a movement from which Art Deco has been curiously and unjustly excluded.

Venue.- Fundación Juan March. Castelló St., 77. Madrid, Spain.
Date.- 26th of March 2015 - 28th of June de 2015.