until Sunday April 19 2015

Mak - Austrian Museum of Applied Arts / Contemporary Art
T : +43 (0)1 711 36-0
Stubenring 5
A - 1010 Wien
Austria

The exhibition presents a contrasting selection of works from two pioneers of Modernism, complete with historical background and examples of their impact extending up to the present day. Josef Hoffmann (1870–1956) and Adolf Loos (1870–1933) were the most important architects and designers in Vienna around 1900 in the generation after Otto Wagner (1841–1918).

In five segments, the exhibition shows key works, their influences, and the impact of the work of Hoffmann and Loos. Beginning with the establishment of individual expressions of taste around 1750, the first two chapters show the achievements and developments of the previous generations upon which Hoffmann and Loos built or to which they reacted. The focus is on the reactions to the crisis in the applied arts in the in-dustrial age as well as the development of a genuinely modern language of form by Otto Wagner.