Wiener Werkstatte

Schrifi (Instruction in
Ornamental Lettering)
of 1907.
At first he had criticized
the Secessionists'
posters as
illegible. He
encouraged them to
make their lettering
more
controlled but without
losing its characteristic
energy.
Among the exercises
Larisch taught them
was filling a
square with the
letterform, to help
develop a fine sense of
figure and ground. The
square was a
consistent motif in
the Secession style,
and it appears in, for
example,
Secessionist stationery
and the monogram
"WW" of the
Wiener Werkstatte. This
distinctly linear
approach to form
was a feature in the
decoration of objects
across various
media, including
tableware, textiles and
architecture.
In addition to the
obviously "designed"
graphic works
of the Werkstatte,
another distinctive
form of graphic
output was their highly
decorative illustrations.
Series of

woodcut and
lithographic prints were
published as
postcards or book
illustrations in richly
coloured, dense
designs, often of a
medievalizing
character. Among the
most notable of the
Werkstatte designers of
lithographic
prints was Carl Otto
Geschka. The
illustrative work
produced in Vienna had
much in common with
the
illustrations and prints
of artists associated
with the
Munich Jugendstil.
Through these projects,
other new
artists were introduced
to the Viennese group,
such as the
young early
Expressionists Oskar
Kokoschka and Egon
Schiele, who both went
on to become famous
painters.
The distinctive graphic
designs of the Wiener
Werkstatte belong to
the years before 1914,
and so are
part of their first phase.
Later, at the height of
their
success, the Werkstatte
were selling designs in
many
media through shops in
Paris and New York, as
well as in
Vienna. Throughout the
1920s the workshops
continued to

produce goods in a
variety of styles, but,
faced with
mounting financial
difficulties, they closed
in 1932.