The Slovenes and Secession W

The Slovenes and Secession ritings on Secession in Slovene regions, and on Slovene artists of Wthe period, have been relatively few. Scarcely any thematic sur veys exist that go beyond a monograph on a single monument or a single architect's oeuvre. Among the authors, mention should first be made of Nace Šumi, who presen ted the Secession architecture of Ljubljana in his pioneering study on the theme; then Fran Šijanec and his general survey of modern art in Slovenia; Borut Rovšnik made a survey of Secession architectural ornamentation; a cata logue was published on the occasion of the exhibition of Secession applied arts in the Narodni muzej (National Museum), Ljubljana; Franc Obal studied the overall features of Secession architecture in Murska Sobota; and Damjan Prelovšek has published a number of well-founded studies on individual problems of Secession ar chitecture here and on the work of some leading architects of the period. 1 The shortcomings of all the studies on Secession in Slovene re gions are, on the one hand, their fragmentary character and, on the other, the presentation of only a few aspects of this phenom enon, which are either more familiar to the authors or their prefer ences. The widest scope, both in terms of the theme and the in clusion of the entire Slovene territory, was achieved in the compi lation of texts published asa catalogue to the exhibition of Seces sion applied arts. Unfortunately, no similar initiative followed to highlight and eval ua te the achievements of this period in the field of architecture and urban planning for all Slovene territory. The first examples of the new style appeared among the Slovenes a few years before the end of the past century. It was not much behind Vienna, considering that the imperial capital only acquired its first two fully Art Nouveau buildings in 1898: Maks Fabiani's and Rudolf Bauer's Pavilion of Three Commissions2 as part of the Emperor Franz Joseph I's Jubilee Exhibition, and the famous Se cession exhibition building by Joseph Maria Olbrich. That same year, i. e. 1898, the first buildings reflecting the new Viennese fashion were built in Ljubljana, Carniola's capital. These were two residential-business houses, one at the corner of the present Čopova ulica and Prešernov trg (3 Prešernov trg) and the other at 1O Wolfova ulica. The two buildings were not created by architects, but are the work of mere builders, so they bear no out standing architectural traits. The so-called Narodna kavarna ("National Cafe") was also opened that year on the ground floor of 1 Gosposka ulica, and Meyer's Cafe one year earlier in Filipov dvorec (Filip Mansion; 9 Stritarjeva ulica). This was projected by the Graz architect Leopold Theyer, who made plans for the entire mansion and also for the building on the opposite side of Stritarjeva ulica (No 6), the so-called Kresija, or "public property". Both buildings were designed in neo Renaissance style, typical of Theyer. Meyer's Cafe, which oper ated for only a short time, is supposed to have been an excellent example of "international fashion before 1900",3 i. e. a mixture of 21 neo-Renaissance and neo-Baroque, with a touch of Secession. Narodna kavarna was designed by Janez Qohn) Jager, a promising young Slovene architect. Its interior decoration was an attempt at the creation of a "Slovene national style". 4 This interior, too, was completely destroyed by re-modelling in 1932. One of the general features of the Art Nouveau movement is its international character. This was also a time when, within indi vidual national variants of Art Nouveau, architects examined the possibilities of how to create a national architectural style. So par ticular off-shoots appeared, i. e. vernacular styles, in various parts of Europe, from Finland, Scandinavia, and Switzerland, to Hun gary, Bohemia, Slovakia, Poland, the Baltic countries, and Russia. In some cases these experiments intermingled with the national romantic movements of the 1880s and 1890s. Such was also the case ofJager's Narodna kavarna. Jager was the first Slovene archi tect to undertake the difficult task of transposing the decorative language of Slovene folk art into architecture or interior decora tion. As has been said, this attempt was rather a failure. Judging from the surviving photographs, the style of Narodna kavarna re semb led the "old German" style more than anything else. The first attempts at a Slovene vernacular style had already been made a few years earlier, in 1895, coinciding with the ethnographic exhibition in Prague, at which Czech archi tects found the inspiration to build residential villas in ver nacular style. 5 At Cerklje in the Gorenjsko re gian, an old farmhouse was adapted by the Czech architect Jan Vladimir Hrasky, to serve as a summer residence. It was Hribar's summer house, commissioned by the later Cerklje (the Mayor of Ljubljana, Ivan Hri Gorenjska bar, an ardent supporter ofPan region) Slavism, then a municipal coun cillor and representative of the Prague "Slavija" bank. The exterior of the house imitates the tra ditional buildings of Gorenjsko by employing wooden decorative additions, such as a balcony surround, barge-boards under the eaves and in the gables, and above all, the timber smoking-room in the rear extension, with its big wooden decorative "lunette". The principal artistic emphasis of the interior lie s in the ne o-Ren aissance grotesques in the reception rooms, and the timber smok ing-room construction over-painted in "national" colours. It is believed that Hribar's role was decisive in the promotion of Ljubljana as the Slovene political, economic, and cultural centre. He began to play such a role after the severe earthquake that struck Ljubljana in 1895, and after he was first elected Mayor in 1896. In matters of urban planning and architecture he relied on two Czechs, the above-mentioned Jan Vladimir Hnisky, the provincial building engineer and head of the municipal building sector, and the municipal architect Jan Duffe. Both favoured historical styles, primarily neo-Renaissance; it was the prevalent style of the 1880s and 1890s, employed for public buildings in Ljubljana and also in other towns on Slovene national territory. So it is not surprising that any work commissioned by the municipal or provincial au thorities until the turn of the century was entrusted to architects who kept to conventional architectural principles. The most characteristic evidence of the prevailing political taste 22 was the construction of a new County Hall in Ljubljana. The com petitors in 1896 inc!uded the young Olbrich, who had as yet won no proper recognition. His project envisaged a balanced building, with a carefully considered spa tia! organisation. The interior deco ration drew on Baroque Classicism, while the exterior was to be adorned with historical ornamentation adapted to Art Nouveau style. In spite of being award ed second prize6 (first prize was not awarded at all) O!brich was not commissioned to do the work which was, curiously, entrusted to Hnisky, whose project was later given to the Viennese architect Hudetz to be reworked. 7 A similar fate to Olbrich's befell the young Plečnik, but it is not so widely known. During his training with Wagner, Plečnik partici pated in a competition for a new town-hall at Idrija. He published his competition project in the same number of Der Architekt8 as Olbrich's competition project for County Hall in Ljubljana. Plečnik's task was far less ambitious: Idrija cannot, after all, be com pared to Ljubljana. Olbrich's artistic weight was much greater than Plečnik's, who was stil! unqualified at that time. So Plečnik's idea of the project appears to be a reduced and extremely simpli fied version of O!brich's solution. The two front fa~ades use simi lar forma! motifs, for instance, a tripartite symmetrical composi tion, rustication, !aure! wreaths, cartouches and pilasters, which stil! belong within the sphere of the architecture of Historicism. Their execution is partly "manneristic". Thus, for example, above the roof cornices, the pilasters of the fa~ade end as finials topped with figural-vegetal decoration. A modern comprehension of ar chitectural design on the fa~ade is partly indicated by the reduc tion of rustication to horizontal bands, leaving large fa~ade sur faces blank, without decoration. In Idrija, too, the local authori ties decided ona conventional solution: a new town-hall was built in 1898 to the plans of an other architect, in an anonymous north ern Renaissance style. The first true Seccesion fa~ade decoration on Slovene territory was realized by the architect Fabiani; the same Fabiani who de signed the Pavilion of Three Commissions, built in 1898 in Vi enna, and the same "M. F." who contributed editorials to the ru bric From Wagner's School for the initial numbers of Der Architekt magazine. 9 Most authors on Viennese architecture and urban planning have virtually failed to recognize Fabiani's role. Two exceptions are Marco Pozzetto, Fabiani's compatriot from the Littoral, and the Hungarian Akos Moravansky. 10 Only recently has the truth been ascertained that Fabiani was the most steadfast of all architects in putting Wagner's ideas about architecture and urban planning of the new era into practice, 11 remaining at the same time a great independent artistic personality. Therefore the fact that fairly nu merous works of this excellent architect survive in Slovenia, par ticularly in Ljubljana, is even more important for the Slovenes. In 1900, a new municipal girls' school was erected on the site of the former "Reduta" (public dance-hall), which had been destroyed by the earthquake.

Load more