36 
The bathroom in Mine. 
Bernheim’s home is of blue 
and green mosaic. The bat h 
has a marble surround, and 
the dresser has a marble 
bracket 
Drawing room, in the 
home of M. Kapjerer, has 
walls of gray and yeVow 
damask and a typically 
Art Nouveau fireplace of 
yellow marble 
The study in the Paris 
home of M. Bernheim has 
walls hung in fluted folds 
of green velvet. The fur¬ 
niture is Louis Phillipe in 
form with gold frames 
House & Garde n\ 
to be archaic or to be wholly 
primitive. It doesn’t in the 
least matter which. We 
either want art that seems 
very old or that is so infan¬ 
tile that it still seems a little 
incoherent. 
In time, as the craze for 
the “new art” increased the 
most adamant of the pro¬ 
ducers began to crave some 
sort of authority, some 
whisper of paternal wisdom, 
and the Secessionists as 
well as Lalique turned to 
Nature for help, feeling 
quite safe on her green 
threshold. And for a num¬ 
ber of years this phase of 
art was dominated by curv¬ 
ing vines, rounded flower 
petals, strangely elaborated 
leaves, always curves, cir¬ 
cles, ovals, delicately mod¬ 
eled figures twined about 
other curves; an essentially 
graceful art, without fire or 
ecstasy except in color. 
This epoch of art, for we 
would not be allowed to call 
it a “period,” has continued 
its grip on Europe up to the 
present day, especially in 
architecture and interior 
decoration. It has devel¬ 
oped some very curious 
manifestations according to 
the temperament of the in¬ 
dividuals most interested in 
its expression. Just before 
the war in some instances it 
degenerated horribly into 
monstrosities in architecture 
and decoration. “Anything 
to be different” had become 
the slogan, and eccentricity 
became the goal in both 
France and Germany. The 
early influence of the beauty 
of nature was swept aside, 
and terrible distortions fol¬ 
lowed, not only of nature, 
but of the human body, and 
then manifestations of 
cruelty, of strange delight in 
wantonness,—as the use of 
man’s heads for the capitals 
of supporting columns, the 
weight of mighty walls rest¬ 
ing on upturned faces. And 
then a cessation of art ex¬ 
pression during the war. 
And today a vigorous upris¬ 
ing, especially in Vienna, 
along the finer, earlier Se¬ 
cession lines, and in France 
still an appreciation of Art 
Nouveau but some barriers 
down and occasionally sim¬ 
plified period furniture in¬ 
troduced quite charmingly 
with the “new art.” 
