Mallet-Stevens, Robert. Le Décor Moderne au Cinéma. Paris: Ch. Massin Éditeur, 1928. 

Poster design by Emilee Matthews.

Image scan by Vera Mak.

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This guide provides information on art, architecture, design, film, and more from the 1920s including links to resources such as books, websites, artist pages, and videos. This guide does not represent a comprehensive list of all the important texts, figures, and design surrounding the 1920s. If you would like to include a resource or book in this list, please use our Suggestions and feedback form or simply email us.    

The ’20’s were a time of great debate: some embraced the future, and some looked toward history for guidance. Revolutions in media and technology changed how people interacted with culture, their everyday surroundings, and the devices and accessories they had.  
 
Art, design, and architecture of the time reflected those tensions. In the 20’s, modernism gained ground among designers: its minimal, modular, and transparent aesthetic alluded to machine-oriented living projected to be easier, cleaner, and more universal. By contrast, Art Deco, swayed viewers with its sensuous use of pattern and its inspiration drawn from the natural world. All the while, revival styles such as Neoclassical, Neo-Georgian, and Egyptian and Gothic revival styles comfortably bridged the past and stylistic traditions with the needs of the day. 
 
This exhibit shows the plethora of possibilities simultaneously cohabitating in the 1920’s, plus local examples of what our university and local urbanisms.