English translation: art in the Secession(ist) style
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Is there something I'm missing, or am I going to have to use the German term and gloss it? Thanks!
"In Wien lassen sich die nicht mehr der Secession unterstehenden „Stilisten“ um Klimt erstmals bei der
Kunstschau Wien 1908 sehen, einer Großausstellung der **Stilkunst** auf dem Baugelände des künftigen Wiener
Konzerthauses, 54 Räume in Baracken aus Holz und weißem Putz, für eine Lebensdauer von wenigen Monaten eilends aufgestellt von Josef Hoffmann."
Explanation: You might be best to gloss it. It does essentially mean Secession(ist) art, used rather pejoratively here. But in the case of this show it is also difficult to use since Klimt et al had just resigned from the Secession and so this exhibition did not take place under that banner.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 27 mins (2012-02-08 12:20:01 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
They had effectively taken Secessionist art away from the Secession which had fallen into conservative hands, if you like.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 42 mins (2012-02-08 12:35:15 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Or Secessionist style perhaps, though not really worth splitting hairs about it, since furniture, applied arts and architectural design were all exhibited alongside painting and sculpture, etc.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 50 mins (2012-02-08 12:43:04 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Stilkunst is loosely the Austrian equivalent of French Art Nouveau or German Jugendstil, but loosely is the operative word here.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 1 hr (2012-02-08 13:30:41 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
interesingly, Peter Vergo in his excellent book, Art in Vienna, 1898 to 1918 does not once find it necessary to use the term Stilkunst, being far more precise in his narrative. It is one of those rather sloppy terms that don't bear much inspection.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 2 hrs (2012-02-08 14:03:48 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Just for clarity's sake, I do think, as I had hoped to make clear, that you should use Stilkunst here and give it the briefest of glosses. In the sentence you provide, it would be confusing to refer to Secessionist art/style unless the wider context has explained, as I did, that Klimt et al had left the Secession by the time of the 1908 Kunstschau.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 4 hrs (2012-02-08 16:47:00 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
It is difficult to be absolute without seeing what your text explains elsewhere and the intended audience. The problem is the confusion between the Secession, that is the exhibiting forum as such, from which artists, such as Klimt departed eventually. The term, Stilkunst, as it is used here denotes their stylistic allegiance to what that organisation, and the Munich /Berlin Secession had come to represent. Somehow you have got to get across the fact that the art is of a style associated with the secessionist tendency whilst not being shown under the umbrella of the Secession as an exhibiting forum. Only you can see what is in the surrounding text obviously, but I hope this helps. It might just be a question of capitalization or otherwise of the word, Secession. Keep the capital for the organisation and the lower case for the stylistic tendency, perhaps.
Wasn't (and am not) sufficiently qualified on the Secession to contribute anything else as a possible 'answer' ('Stilkunst' was new to me) - but what an instructive debate this has been.
Whether you gloss it or not partly depends on who the book is written for. If it's an academic text, readers will know what Stilkunst means, whereas if it's a coffee-table book, it will need a very brief explanation. I also think you should leave "Stilisten" inGerman.
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Answers
1 hr confidence: peer agreement (net): +1
Stilkunst (+ gloss)
Explanation: Probably safest to leave as "Stilkunst" and provide a gloss,
given that the founding members of the Secessionist movement were by now distancing themselves from it.
Morten Kristiansen, "Richard Strauss, Die Moderne, and the Concept of Stilkunst." The Musical Quarterly, 86, 689-749 (2002).
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 1 hr (2012-02-08 13:03:07 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Colin Rowe Germany Local time: 03:58 Native speaker of: English PRO pts in category: 12
3 hrs confidence: peer agreement (net): -1
Stilkunst (non-naturalistic art)
Explanation: If we are all agreed that the term needs to be glossed, then I would say that the choice of the gloss is the main issue. This is my suggestion.
"Stilkunst" is basically a negatively defined term (= everything that is non-naturalistic) encompassing everything from van Gogh, Jan Toorop, and Klimt to someone whose work is as tame as Carl Moll's, but - in this context - also very much includes the work of the Austrian Expressionists Kokoschka and Schiele.
In other contexts, "Stilkunst" can mean "Secessionist art" or also "Historicist art," but not here.
I would also gloss "Stilisten" as "anti-naturalists."
Sample sentences:
Grove Art Online (search: Josef Engelhart):
"However, the latent conflict between the Naturalists under the painter Josef Engelhart (1864–1941) and the so-called Stylists under Klimt split the Secession, and in 1905 Klimt and his party left the association."
"Differences of opinion between the Klimtgruppe and the Naturalists under the leadership of Josef Engelhart (1864–1941) led to a division of the Secessionists. The Naturalists or Nur-Maler of the Secession propagated a return to the fine arts."
If you search the best German Google hits with some combination of Engelhart's name, "Naturalisten", 1905, etc., I think that the results generally support my solution. ... some kind of gloss with "the so-called Klimt-Group" might also be possible. Helen is right that the implications of the Gesamtkunstwerk/ Raumkunst are lost, but I think that something like the gloss "that style of art most typically associated with the Secession" would exclude what made this show historically significant.
Michael Wetzel Germany Local time: 03:58 Specializes in field Native speaker of: English PRO pts in category: 8
Notes to answerer
Asker: Thanks Michael - I may well be able to use that info elsewhere in the text.
Explanation: You might be best to gloss it. It does essentially mean Secession(ist) art, used rather pejoratively here. But in the case of this show it is also difficult to use since Klimt et al had just resigned from the Secession and so this exhibition did not take place under that banner.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 27 mins (2012-02-08 12:20:01 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
They had effectively taken Secessionist art away from the Secession which had fallen into conservative hands, if you like.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 42 mins (2012-02-08 12:35:15 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Or Secessionist style perhaps, though not really worth splitting hairs about it, since furniture, applied arts and architectural design were all exhibited alongside painting and sculpture, etc.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 50 mins (2012-02-08 12:43:04 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Stilkunst is loosely the Austrian equivalent of French Art Nouveau or German Jugendstil, but loosely is the operative word here.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 1 hr (2012-02-08 13:30:41 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
interesingly, Peter Vergo in his excellent book, Art in Vienna, 1898 to 1918 does not once find it necessary to use the term Stilkunst, being far more precise in his narrative. It is one of those rather sloppy terms that don't bear much inspection.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 2 hrs (2012-02-08 14:03:48 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Just for clarity's sake, I do think, as I had hoped to make clear, that you should use Stilkunst here and give it the briefest of glosses. In the sentence you provide, it would be confusing to refer to Secessionist art/style unless the wider context has explained, as I did, that Klimt et al had left the Secession by the time of the 1908 Kunstschau.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 4 hrs (2012-02-08 16:47:00 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
It is difficult to be absolute without seeing what your text explains elsewhere and the intended audience. The problem is the confusion between the Secession, that is the exhibiting forum as such, from which artists, such as Klimt departed eventually. The term, Stilkunst, as it is used here denotes their stylistic allegiance to what that organisation, and the Munich /Berlin Secession had come to represent. Somehow you have got to get across the fact that the art is of a style associated with the secessionist tendency whilst not being shown under the umbrella of the Secession as an exhibiting forum. Only you can see what is in the surrounding text obviously, but I hope this helps. It might just be a question of capitalization or otherwise of the word, Secession. Keep the capital for the organisation and the lower case for the stylistic tendency, perhaps.
VIENNA.- Following disagreement within the Secession and the spectacular leaving of the “Klimt-Group”, the inscription “To the time its art, to art its freedom” was removed from its building’s doors in 1907 and made the motto of the Kunstschau 1908, an exhibition that is still regarded as trailblazing for the development of Modern Art in Vienna.
The Kunstschau 1908 was conceived by numerous artists around Gustav Klimt and coincided with the celebrations held in Vienna on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the reign of Emperor Francis Joseph I. The artists were not invited to participate in the imperial procession but were offered the use of construction land as an exhibition venue which had been designated for the location of the Konzerthaus in the city centre and was temporarily lying fallow. In only a few months, Josef Hoffmann, Gustav Klimt, Otto Prutscher, Koloman Moser, and others built and furnished wooden structures accommodating 54 exhibition rooms, gardens, interior courtyards, a small cemetery, a café, and a summer stage - as well as a two-storey, completely furnished country house. Painting, sculpture, the graphic and decorative arts, and stage design were combined to create a Gesamtkunstwerk – a synthesis of the arts – on exhibition premises covering 6,500 square metres. Indoor and outdoor floor space, walls, and showcases were filled and covered with works by 176 artists, including Carl Moll, Franz Kupka, Max Oppenheimer and numerous students from the Vienna School of Arts and Crafts, like Oskar Kokoschka.
The art historian Werner Hofmann described the concurrence of the procession – the Kaiserjubiläumshuldigungsfestzug – and the Kunstschau as a “synopsis of the monarchy’s official art and intellectual histories”. Whereas the procession staged the Habsburg monarchy’s long tradition and national diversity, Gustav Klimt, in his opening speech, declared the Kunstschau to be “a display of the performance of artistic volition in Austria”, compiled by artists who “were not affiliated with a collective, an association, or a league”, but who had “gathered in an informal fashion solely for the purpose of this exhibition”.
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Colin Rowe Germany Native speaker of: English PRO pts in category: 12
The translation workplace 
peer agreement (net): +1
