Decadent movement

also: Decadentism

movement c. 1880-1900 France Belgium

The Decadent movement flourished in France, Belgium, and Britain in the 1880s and 1890s, named after critics' jibes that its writers were heirs to a declining civilisation - a charge they proudly embraced. Descended from Baudelaire and Théophile Gautier's doctrine of "art for art's sake," it prized the artificial over the natural and sensation over edifying content. Joris-Karl Huysmans' novel À rebours (1884), whose aesthete hero retreats into a world of rare perfumes and perverse beauty, became the movement's handbook. In visual art it produced Félicien Rops's cruel eroticism, Gustave Moreau's ornate symbolist canvases, and Aubrey Beardsley's sinuous black-and-white illustrations. Oscar Wilde's 1895 trial and Beardsley's early death turned the public against the label, but the sensibility fed directly into Symbolism and Art Nouveau.

Lead image of the Wikipedia article "Decadent movement".
Lead image of the Wikipedia article "Decadent movement".Public domain (credit: Félicien Rops) · source

Defining characteristics

  • Artifice prized over nature: rare perfumes, jewels, and cultivated sensation as subject
  • Sinuous, ornamental line and densely patterned surfaces
  • Morbid, erotic, and sardonic subject matter, often with a cruel edge
  • Femme fatale imagery, sinister saints, and scenes of ritual or ennui
  • Flat, Japanese-inspired picture space with decorative black-and-white contrast
  • Exquisite, self-conscious style valued above moral or narrative content

Key figures

  • Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867) — Poet of Les fleurs du mal (1857), the sensibility's origin point
  • Joris-Karl Huysmans (1848-1907) — His novel À rebours (1884) gave the movement its aesthete hero and handbook
  • Gustave Moreau (1826-1898) — Symbolist painter of ornate, jewel-like mythological scenes
  • Félicien Rops (1833-1898) — Belgian printmaker of erotic-satanic imagery (Pornokratès, 1878)
  • Aubrey Beardsley (1872-1898) — British illustrator whose black line defined decadent book design

Example works

Sources

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