Koloman Moser

An Austrian artist-decorator, painter, illustrator and poster artist.

He was born into the family of Josef Moser, a teacher and director of the gymnasium. After graduation, Koloman learned to paint at the trade school in Widen.

Koloman Moser is the most important figure of Austrian Art Nouveau (Jugendstil), a founding member of the Vienna Secession and the organizer of the famous “Vienna workshops”, where the artistic design of household items was massively performed. Together with Gustav Klimt K. Moser drew illustrations for “Sacred Spring”, the leading art magazine of Austria, and created several posters of the Vienna Secession exhibitions. The artist made a large number of sketches for the decoration of jewelries, lamps, textiles and dishes. He was a trendsetter in the interior, especially furniture design, which was in great demand among the admirers of Art Nouveau. Stained-glass window by Koloman Moser is depicted on the commemorative coin of 100 euros, issued in 2005.

One of the artist’s greatest achievements was the stained glass and murals of the Steinhoff Wagner church, which he made in 1904. After exiting from the Vienna Secession in 1905 and the “Vienna Workshops” in 1907, Moser began to pay much attention to paintings. In the author’s creative heritage, there is a large number of landscapes, still lifes and portraits, painted in an energetic manner with bright, saturated colors, sometimes in unusual and bold combinations.

Key Ideas:

– Koloman Moser showed himself in the most diverse areas of artistic creativity. He is known as the creator of graphically perfect postcards, posters, elegant pieces of furniture and household items, as well as ladies’ outfits in the style of art nouveau. His works are distinguished by smooth lines, originality of the color solution and accord with the stylistics of his epoch.

– The elegant and strictly geometric designs of furniture made of metal and wood, in which the cubic form appears as a functional aesthetics, are a vivid example of Art Nouveau of the early 20th century. The most reproducible work of Moser from this initial period is the poster he painted in 1899 for the exhibition of the Fifth Secession. It demonstrates the flourishing of the creative powers of Moser as the representative of Art Nouveau and generally is a model of the graphic design of Art Nouveau. The images are lithographed with a small set of three colors – pale yellow, dark green and the color of old gold, but the sense of tangible depth and figured plasticity is clearly conveyed. The free use of a line creates a rare smoothness – “seamlessness” in the design.

– Different areas of the poster are united by vine-like curves – they fill almost all free space. In this and other posters, even the inscriptions were carefully thought out to harmonize and partially merge with the ornament, while remaining completely and easily readable. Thus, Moser achieves a high degree of aesthetic unity, not sacrificing the functionality of the promotional artwork.

– Despite the fact that the author makes an emphasis on nature (a vegetable pattern), there are works in which the center is a certain winged figure that is difficult to identify – whether it’s an angel, or a divine spirit or something else. A similar nature of uncertainty is sometimes acquired by plants, similar to both grapes and fantastic berries or fruits.

– Moser’s favorite theme was mountain landscapes, which he performed in various variations of coloristic decisions. The artist created the most beautiful paintings of the Austrian Alps, simplifying the composition and discarding the naturalistic detailing. Depicting nature, he gave great importance to colors and lines, thanks to which the landscapes of Koloman Moser become close in spirit to Japanese graphic images.