Stile Balcan, or “Oh My God What Is That”—Art Deco architecture in the Balkans
The term “Art Deco” originated from the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Moderns held in Paris in 1925. The architect Le Corbusier, then living in Paris and growing in both fame and influence, built the Esprit Nouveau Pavilion for the exposition with a design, as did his writings, that denounced the decorative arts popular at the time in architecture and interior design. Subsequently becoming one of the most influential mid-century modernist architects in the world, Le Corbusier considered 1925 and the exposition the end of the old and the beginning of the new in terms of architectural style and urban planning.
Although Le Corbusier used the term “Arts Deco” in his writings, the term was not popularized until the 1960s as the name of the architectural style of the 1920s and ‘30s. The sleek style of Art Deco can be found from the restored hotels in glitzy Miami Beach to the imposing skyscrapers, such as the Chrysler Building, of New York City. And this blogger recently re-launched a blog documenting Art Deco buildings in Bosnia, Montenegro, and other countries in the Balkans, where the adapted style appeared in the 1950s.
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Recent post July 30, 2017