Important Vintage Wiener Werkstätte Vase ca. 1900

This important hand-painted vintage ceramic vase is a Wiener Werkstatt production ca 1900 and bares the hallmark Austria. The Wiener Werkstätte (Viennese Workshops) was one of the longest-lived design movements of the twentieth century and a key organisation for the development of modernism. Centered in the Austrian capital, it stood at the doorway between traditional methods of manufacture and a distinctly avant-garde aesthetic. The Werkstätte functioned as the distributor for the Wiener Keramik, a ceramics enterprise founded by Berthold Loffler and Michael Powolny. The Wiener Keramik would supply tilework for some of the Werkstätte's most significant commissions, such as the famous interior decor of the Cabaret Fledermaus in Vienna. Important ceramicists from that time where Gudrun Baudisch, Maria Likarz, Jutta Sika, Valerie Wieselthier, and Mathilde Flogl.

Both its stylistic features and decoration of this vase show the distinctive style of Karl Klaus. At the time, the young architect and designer had just completed his studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna, where he had studied under Josef Hoffmann, among others. His designs for Ernst Wahliss Vienna were already among the company's most popular designs at the time and are still highly regarded in the art world today.

This rare find is a museum piece, featuring intrinsic ceramic detail. It is a fully functional decorative vase and can be filled with flowers.