American Arts Crafts Virtue In Design Author:Leslie Greene Bowman The American arts and crafts movement is one of the most significant in the history of decorative arts. Influenced by developments in Europe, American proponents in the late 19th and early 20th centuries successfully promoted the "minor arts" as fine art handwrought by individual craftsmen, extolling the virtues of everyday objects and a return... more » to honest, simple, forthright materials and workmanship. Ironically, most products were actually hybrids made by many hands and often by machines as well. Still, the designs are perhaps the closet embodiment we have of "American style."
Here, in this lavishly illustrated volume, are the finest expressions of the American arts and crafts movement. Based on the Palevsky/Evans Collection, one of the most comprehensive private arts and crafts collections in the United States, and related works from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, this splendid catalogue highlights some 250 decorative art pieces, dating from the 1880s to the 1930s. Included are furniture, metalwork, ceramics, glass, books, drawings, and textiles by Gustav Stickley, Greene and Greene, Frank Lloyd Wright, the Roycrofters, Tiffany Studios, George Ohr, and many others.« less