Joseph Urban

Austrian-born artist Joseph Urban (1872-1933) was a highly prolific designer and architect in the early twentieth century, recognized for his notable impact on shaping American modernism. He arrived in the United States just as modernist influences wereemerging in architecture and design, and over the next two decades would become one of the most significant designers working at the forefront of the new era. Urban's distinctive style-a combination of Viennese fin-de-siáecle design, cutting-edge Art Deco forms and bold color-lent itself to several high-profile projects, including set designs for the Metropolitan Opera, the Ziegfeld Follies, and Hollywood films; the building and interiors for the New School in New York; and the color direction for the 1933 World's Fair in Chicago. Joseph Urban : Unlocking an Art Deco Bedroom presents an Urban-designed interior commissioned in 1929 for the teenage daughter of Chicagoans Mr. and Mrs. Leo F. Wormser. Since 1973, the Cincinnati Art Museum has held the most complete collection of elements from this rare, avant-garde bedroom. Utilizing period photographs, blueprints, the artist's design sketches, invoices, recorded interviews, and other primary resources, the museum has fully researched, conserved, and installed this exceptional Art Deco space. This volume, illustrated with over 90 images, features five essays that reveal the story of the Wormser family commission and highlight Urban's wide-ranging career, his role in defining American modernism, the country'sacceptance of modernist designs, and the bedroom's restoration and reinstallation. This publication accompanies the exhibition Unlocking an Art Deco Bedroom by Joseph Urban on display at the Cincinnati Art Museum from July 8 to October 2, 2022--