Poster for the First Darmstadt Artists’ Colony Exhibition, “A Document of German Art”

Founded in 1899, the Darmstadt Artists’ Colony was a community of artists and architects who constructed an environment that reflected the formal qualities and philosophical tenets of the Jugenstil movement. Stylistically, Jugenstil is marked by sinuous lines and "whiplash" curves derived from nature, and members of the Darmstadt Artists’ Colony applied the distinctive formal qualities of the movement to designs in architecture, the decorative arts, utilitarian objects, and graphic design. Peter Behrens, one of the founding members of the Colony and a leading architect in Germany during the early twentieth century, was a skilled graphic and typeface designer. A stylized gold caryatid – an architectural pillar or column fashioned as a female figure – stands at the center of his poster advertising the first exhibition of the Darmstadt Artists’ Colony of 1901, indicating the prominence that architecture played in the exhibition. The poster is rendered in jewel tones and features a sans-serif font that Behrens designed.