The Biedermeier style

Magazine Antiques, Oct, 2006 by Allison Eckardt Ledes

The clean lines and purity of form that characterize decorative and fine arts created during the early nineteenth century in central and northern Europe, particularly in Austria and Germany, in the style known today as Biedermeier, has been an area of scholarly inquiry and collector interest for several decades. An ambitious exhibition on this style, consisting of more than four hundred objects in a wide variety of mediums, has been organized by the Milwaukee Art Museum (where it is on view until January 1, 2007), in collaboration with the Deutsches Historiches Museum in Berlin and the Albertina in Vienna. The show, which is entitled Biedermeier: The Invention of Simplicity, will then travel to those two institutions and also to the Musee du Louvre in Paris. The dates of those showings will be listed in Calendar.

As Hans Ottomeyer explains in the gargantuan accompanying catalogue, "In the past, there have been significant misconceptions about the origins and development of Biedermeier. The term was usually applied as a nonspecific and overarching designation for the entire period from 1815 to 1848, connoting the cliche of a new bourgeois style, embraced by a stronger middle class in a time of social and political upheaval." Today, the scholars who have contributed to the catalogue see the style as an outgrowth of the patronage of artists and craftsmen by those in the upper reaches of society--royalty, nobility, and the aristocracy. From these origins, it filtered down to the nouveaux riches.

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The Biedermeier style emerged during a time of economic hardship in the wake of fifteen years of war and a blockade barring imported goods that was in effect from 1806 to 1814. Conceived as something entirely different from the Empire style that was widely popular all over Europe at the time, Biedermeier is, according to Ottomeyer, "characterized by abstraction in form, ornamentation, and color." The profusion of ornament that was a hallmark of Empire furniture was stripped away by Biedermeier craftsmen, who had been trained within the strict confines of the guild system. They banished the robust carved elements, glittering ormolu mounts, intricate inlays, and surface gilding of earlier styles in favor of striking veneers that emphasized the simple geometries of a piece of furniture.

While some Biedermeier furniture looks extremely modern, it is the ceramics, metalwares, and wallpapers that most convincingly fool the eye with their surprisingly early dates. Indeed, some pieces resemble objects designed by members of the Wiener Werkstatte, which was established in Vienna nearly one hundred years later, a time that Christian Witt-Dorring now refers to as the "Biedermeier revival."

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The catalogue of the exhibition contains contributions by an international roster of scholars. It may be obtained from the Milwaukee Art Museum at 414-224-3210.