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A review by writingmidnight96
Art Nouveau by Gabriele Fahr-Becker
challenging
lighthearted
slow-paced
4.25
Okay, It took me a year and a half, but I have finished the book cover to cover. I love Art Nouveau, and picked this up thinking it would be a relatively quick read with a broad overview of the movement that a flip through showed included a lot of very high-quality photographs of the artworks being discussed.
Clearly, I was wrong about the pace, because while the photos are numerous and large the text is dense and tiny. It is a very in-depth overview of Art Nouveau. It is an excellent resource that is well organized. The writing style of the main text is not dry, but it is very straight to the point, intermixed with quotes contemporary to the movement that add quite a bit of color to the individual sections.
I'd highly recommend this book either as reference or as a cover-to-cover read if you're very interested in Art Nouveau, It is also a lovely page though if you read art historical texts more for the images than the text. I would not recommend sitting down to read the whole thing at once, I basically worked through it 1-2 chapters a month some months with some months taken off when I didn't have the time or the brain space for something this dense. But it is an Excellent history of the movement.
Clearly, I was wrong about the pace, because while the photos are numerous and large the text is dense and tiny. It is a very in-depth overview of Art Nouveau. It is an excellent resource that is well organized. The writing style of the main text is not dry, but it is very straight to the point, intermixed with quotes contemporary to the movement that add quite a bit of color to the individual sections.
I'd highly recommend this book either as reference or as a cover-to-cover read if you're very interested in Art Nouveau, It is also a lovely page though if you read art historical texts more for the images than the text. I would not recommend sitting down to read the whole thing at once, I basically worked through it 1-2 chapters a month some months with some months taken off when I didn't have the time or the brain space for something this dense. But it is an Excellent history of the movement.