Art Deco: A Research Guide

Art Deco was an international decorative style than ran from 1919 to 1939. Known initially as "le style moderne" or "Jazz Moderne," the style received its current name in 1968, during a period of scholarly reappraisal. Art Deco developed first in France, and attracted international notice through a government-sponsored exposition held in 1925. The exciting array of works on display included a wide range of avant-garde, luxurious, and lighthearted artistic modes.

After 1925, designs increasingly reflected the rapid artistic and technological innovations of the period between two world wars, incorporating chic elegance, eclectic historical and national imagery, and Machine Age forms into an effervescent decorative vision. Art Deco originated in a time of intense aesthetic experimentation; art movements such as the Bauhaus, Constructivism, Cubism, De Stijl, Futurism, Orphism, and Surrealism helped define the style's inherent modernism.

Art Deco design exemplified opulent consumption, crass commercialism, and the acceleration of contemporary life summed up in the Futurist credo "Speed is beauty." Art Deco's greatest achievement, however, came in its mature phase, when designers liberated the machine from long-standing artistic contempt.

The Art & Architecture Collection has excellent holdings of primary resource materials on Art Deco, including pattern books, design manuals, and catalogues from the original Paris Exposition of 1925. Many secondary resource materials are also available in the Library collections, from monographs on art, architecture, and design to survey histories of the period.

Using the Library's Catalog

When searching the Library's catalog, be aware that it uses subject heading terms from The Library of Congress Subject Headings. As a result, there is a direct subject heading for Art Deco architecture:

Art Deco (architecture)

To search Art Deco as a narrower term try:

Decoration and Ornament -- Art Deco

Also, geographic subdivisions can be used, as in:

Art Deco -- France

One can also research Art Deco exhibitions:

Art Deco -- catalogues
Art Deco -- collectors and collecting
Art Deco -- exhibitions
Art Deco -- bibliography

Related headings of use may be:

France -- Social life and customs -- 20th century
New York -- Social life and customs -- 20th century

Survey Histories

These titles provide overviews to the time period and offer social contexts for the development of the Art Deco style.

General Reference

Margulies, Phillip, ed. The Roaring Twenties. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2004. A chronological record with emphasis on United States history.

Streissguth, Thomas. The Roaring Twenties. New York: Facts on File, 2007. The format of this book allows quick access to factual data, and makes connections between U.S. and European developments.

France—Social History

Scarlett, Frank and Townley, Marjorie. Arts Decoratifs 1925: A Personal Recollection of the Paris Exhibition. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1975.
A first-hand look at the Exposition that defined Art Deco. Appraises the various pavilions and designer displays, looks at national arts presentations, and gives a vivid sense of what was happening in Paris at that time.

Zeldin, Theodore. France, 1848-1945. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1973-77.
A solid survey of the social, economic, and political developments before, during, and after the Art Deco decades. Particularly good text on the effects of the first World War.

New York—Social History

Cable, Mary. Top Drawer: American High Society from the Gilded Age to the Roaring Twenties. New York: Atheneum, 1984.
A glimpse into the café society that spurred jazz and modern art. Upper class Americans imbibed the latest developments from Europe, including le style moderne.

Olson, James Stuart. Historical Dictionary of the 1920s: from World War I to the New Deal, 1919-1933. New York: Greenwood Press, 1988.
Another useful chronological examination of an important time period.

Wilson, Richard Guy, Dianne H. Pilgrim, Dickran Tashjian.The Machine Age in America, 1918-1941. New York: Brooklyn Museum in association with Abrams, 1986.
Explains the emergence of Machine Art in America, a sub-genre of the Art Deco style.

Selected Historical Titles

Primary source material from the Art Deco era includes: pattern books, plate books, periodicals and catalogues from exhibitions and shows. Illustrations from many of these publications were richly rendered in the pochoir technique. A form of printmaking, pochoir artists used a pain-staking hand-applied process involving gouache watercolor and stencil plates.

The following are a sample of the various plate books to be found in the Art and Architecture Collection:

Reference Resources by Topic

Art Deco Style

Arwas, Victor. Art Deco. London: Academy Editions, 1992. Useful survey text appraises the style and offers significant artistic examples.

Battersby, Martin. The Decorative Twenties. London: Herbert, 1988. A more cautious account of the Art Deco era with emphasis on artistic influences.

Duncan, Alastair. The Encyclopedia of Art Deco New York: E.P. Dutton, 1988. Alphabetical arrangement of relevant topics.

Encyclopédie des arts décoratifs et industriels modernes au XXème siècle: twelve volumes documenting the Paris exhibition of 1925. New York: Garland, 1977. A reprint summary of the original Exposition catalogues with commentary.

Hillier, Bevis. Art Deco of the 20s and 30s. London: Studio Vista, 1968. Seminal text by the British art historian who coined the term "Art Deco."

Hillier, Bevis and Stephen Escritt. Art Deco Style. London: Phaidon, 1977. An art historical reappraisal based on an exhibition.

Maurice Pillard-Verneuil: Artiste Decorateur de l'Art Nouveau, 1869-1942. Paris: Somogy Editions d'Art, 2000. A catalogue of an important designer who worked in both Art Nouveau and Art Deco modes.

Schleuning, Sarah. Moderne: fashioning the French interior. Miami Beach; New York: Wolfsonian-Florida International University; Princeton Architectural Press, 2008. Based on an important exhibition of Deco interior design through significant publications.

Wood, Ghislaine. Essential Art Deco. London: V&A Publications, 2003. Concise summary of the style, its effect on art and design, and legacy.

Art Deco Architecture

Bayer, Patricia. Art Deco Architecture: design, decoration, and detail from the twenties and thirties. London: Thames & Hudson, 1992. Covers all the major points about the style's architectural applications.

Breeze, Carla. American Art Deco: architecture and regionalism. New York: W.W. Norton, 2003. This survey shows how the style spread through the United States, taking various forms, e.g. Pueblo Deco.

Robinson, Cervin and Rosemarie Haag Bletter. Skyscraper Style: Art Deco, New York. New York: Oxford University Press, 1975. Academic study puts Deco skyscrapers in their proper architectural context. Emphasis on the innovations in these buildings.

Art Deco Fashion

Battersby, Martin. Art Deco Fashion: French designers 1908-1925. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1974. This well-illustrated text describes the innovations in dress that led into the Art Deco era.

Costantino, Maria. >Fashions of a decade: the 1930s. New York: Facts on File, 1992. Covers all aspects of clothing and dress during this decade, including fads and garment changes, the influence of Hollywood, etc.

Herald, Jacqueline. Fashions of a decade: the 1920s. New York: Facts on File, 1991. Records the visual changes, fads, and stylistic trends of the decade.

Lussier, Suzanne. Art Deco Fashion. London: V&A, 2003. A concise survey of dress with authoritative information on social influences and impact.

Samuels, Charlotte. Art Deco Textiles. London: V&A, 2003. This work illustrates the rich designs created for textiles in the 1920s and 1930s.

Art Deco New York

Breeze, Carla. New York Deco. New York: Rizzoli, 1993. Another concise guide to Deco buildings by type of usage, e.g. commercial, residential, public, ecclesiastical, etc.

Lowe, David Garrard. Art Deco New York. New York: Watson-Guptill, 2004. An invaluable resource to the city's social history, monuments, and urban spirit.

Messier, Norbert. The Art Deco Skyscraper in New York. New York: P. Lang, 1986. A practical architectural history of the great age of Deco towers.

Stravitz, David. The Chrysler Building: creating a New York icon day by day. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2002. A revealing chronicle of the rise of one of Art Deco's major monuments.

Periodicals

Apollo. London: Apollo, 1925-.

Art et Décoration. Paris: Éditions Albert Lévy, 1897-1935.

Gazette des Beaux Arts Paris, 1859-1959.

Gazette du bon ton: arts, modes & frivolité. Paris, 1912-1925.

L'Art Décoratif: revue de la vie artistique, ancienne et moderne. Paris, 1898.

Locating Journal Articles

Periodical Indexes

Articles written on Art Deco can be found in the following relevant online indexes, found on the Library's Selected Electronic Resources file under the heading "Art & Architecture":

If a journal is located in one of these indexes, the next step requires searching the journal's title in the catalog to see if the Library owns this periodical, and then finding the classmark whereby the item can be requested.

* represents indices that feature a higher proportion of articles related to clothing history

Visual Electronic Resources

The Library's website www.nypl.org provides access to the Digital Gallery, where thousands of Art Deco-related images can be found. The Digital Gallery is also the online resource of the Picture Collection, containing over 30,000 images from that collection. The Picture Collection possesses more than a million physical images on file in folders, and is located at the Mid-Manhattan Library on 5th Avenue and 40th Street. A limited amount of historical Deco images can be found by searching the scholarly image database ARTstor, which compiles artworks and illustrations from museum and other cultural collections.

Selected Internet Resources

Internet resources on Art Deco can be problematic, since a majority of these sites are commercial in nature. The following are useful:

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