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Lot Essay
Recorded in the MAK WW archives, Book Inventory No. B.I.18873.
cf. Waltraud Neuwrith. Wiener Werkstätte. Avantgarde, Art Deco, Industrial Design, 1984, p. 208, no. 165.
Despite the acute financial difficulties facing the WW in 1928, a large jubilee celebration was undertaken to mark the 25th anniversary of its founding. The souvenir publication for this event was intended to illustrate the development of the Wiener Werkstätte and its products since 1903. The hand-embossed papier-maché covers and the layout of the interior can be seen as a final example of Gesamtkunstwerk by the Wiener Werkstätte.
In the face of imminent failure, the WW nevertheless still managed to garner glowing reviews:
"What is new about this album ... is that every single page has been composed in accordance with specific artistic conceptions, and that colours - black, red, gold and silver - have been used in order to enliven these pages. As a part of this, reproductions, text and all the white and coloured surfaces have been treated as elements of entirely equal visual value and have been harmoniously combined." (Article in Wiener Zeitung, 17 January, 1929)
cf. Waltraud Neuwrith. Wiener Werkstätte. Avantgarde, Art Deco, Industrial Design, 1984, p. 208, no. 165.
Despite the acute financial difficulties facing the WW in 1928, a large jubilee celebration was undertaken to mark the 25th anniversary of its founding. The souvenir publication for this event was intended to illustrate the development of the Wiener Werkstätte and its products since 1903. The hand-embossed papier-maché covers and the layout of the interior can be seen as a final example of Gesamtkunstwerk by the Wiener Werkstätte.
In the face of imminent failure, the WW nevertheless still managed to garner glowing reviews:
"What is new about this album ... is that every single page has been composed in accordance with specific artistic conceptions, and that colours - black, red, gold and silver - have been used in order to enliven these pages. As a part of this, reproductions, text and all the white and coloured surfaces have been treated as elements of entirely equal visual value and have been harmoniously combined." (Article in Wiener Zeitung, 17 January, 1929)