Art Deco Sculptures from the 1920s and 1930s: A Brief
History.
These small-scale figurines that conjure up images of cocktails
and flappers, wild jazz music, Hollywood
and divine decadence and seem frozen in time, created by now
famous sculptors such as Demetre
Chiparus, Ferdinand
Preiss, Josef Lorenzl,
Bruno Zach and Claire
Colinet. Taking their inspiration from the dancers, cabaret
performers, movie stars and fashion in Hollywood, Paris and Berlin
at that time these sculptors produced works that perfectly capture
the spirit and energy of the period between the wars.
These decorative bronze figurines were produced in France,
Germany and Austria and painted with enamel paints and lacquer,
with the more expensive examples having heads and limbs of carved
ivory. Produced for home decoration in the 1920s and 1930s and
originally for sale in jewellers and department stores they were
often given as wedding presents and presentation gifts. Often they
were custom-made in coloured finishes to match the customer's room
decoration and tips were given on how to display the figures for
maximum effect in illuminated niches. Hence examples (especially
by Ferdinand Preiss) can be found on many different coloured
marble and onyx bases, mounted on clocks and turned into lamps.
Inevitably the success of these figurines led to cheaper
alternatives created for those who didn't have the means to buy
the chryselephantine figures but desired the look. So one can find
examples of large French figurative groups (often signed
Menneville) made of spelter (a zinc based metal) combined with an
imitation ivory known as ivorine that give the look (but not the
quality) of the large bronze and ivory groups by Chiparus. Germany
also produced spelter and ivorine figurines but these are much
smaller in size. There were also many examples of figurines made
solely of spelter and coloured with metallic enamels; once again
the larger examples are usually French and mounted on often
extravagant marble bases with the German (and Austrian) examples
being much smaller and usually mounted on alabaster rather than
the more expensive marble and onyx.
Germany also produced many quality Art Deco figure "lady" lamps
made of spelter which are decorated with gold and silver lacquers
and holding globes, the glass crackled, “marbled” or more rarely
internally hand decorated to resemble alabaster. These lamps
(often "inspired" by the French lamps of Max Le Verrier and bronzes by Lorenzl and
Preiss) seem to have been very popular in the UK (examples can be
found in department store catalogues from the 1930s). The more
often than not naked young ladies were mounted on shaped granite
or alabaster bases, holding aloft their illuminated globes until
the glass got broken or they were no longer considered fashionable
(or appropriate!) and were banished to a cupboard or put into
storage.
Derided by snobby critics at the time as being nothing more than
“decoration” Art Deco sculptures fell into disrepute and it wasn't
until the mid 1970s that they began to be taken seriously as small
scale works of art with the more important bronzes and sculptors
being included in sales of Art Deco and Nouveau by the major
auction houses. Consequently all Art Deco figurines whether they
were made of bronze, spelter or ceramic were rediscovered and
since then these stylish sculptures have once again been adding a
touch of Art Deco glamour to homes all around the world...© Craig
- 20th Century Decorative Arts.