Partage Plus

Why Art Nouveau?

The Art Nouveau style was a great success all over Europe at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. It is well represented, in almost every art form, in museum collections, archives, libraries, photographic archives, and on buildings throughout Europe.

After a short period of disinterest, with the arrival of modernist styles, it seems that Art Nouveau is now even more popular than ever. Because of this Partage Plus can count on an immense interest from a range of specialists, and from the public in general, who wish to know more about the masterful creations in this imaginative style. The objects, paintings, drawings, and sculptures from that period are now appreciated for the masterpieces of craftsmanship and originality they are.

Furthermore Art Nouveau monuments are now recognized by UNESCO on their World Heritage List as significant contributions to cultural heritage. Partage Plus will create an access point to information (through the project website) and digital content (through Europeana) on the European cultural heritage of the Art Nouveau period. It provides a means and a structure for the digitisation of content from different domains and different countries and making it available for citizens using Europeana.

Why Partage Plus?

Partage Plus digitised over 76 thousand pieces of content for ingestion into Europeana. This was carried out by the partners in the project. It also used existing Art Nouveau in Europeana and encouraged others with relevant collections to do the same. This amount of content represents a significant increase in the amount of Art Nouveau content available on the Web. It also include masterpieces by:

• Victor Horta
• Henri van de Velde
• Charles Rennie Mackintosh
• Alphons Mucha; • Hector Guimard
• Emile Gallé
• René Lalique
• Paul Hankar
• Josef Maria Olbrich
• Wilhelm Jost

Users and their needs

The target user groups for Art Nouveau-related digital material, and their needs, are:

• Curators of Art Nouveau
• Communities interested in Art Nouveau in their area
• Private sector including: collectors, dealers, and relevant publishers
• Education sector
• Media
• Academic researchers

Partage Plus met their needs by:

• Using the Partage Plus website
• Increasing the amount of Art Nouveau material
• Enabling Art Nouveau in Europeana

User Experience of Partage Plus

The Partage Plus website will form the hub for meeting users’ needs. Those wanting to:

• See information about the Art Nouveau style
• Experience Art Nouveau works online through Europeana
• Visit organisations with Art Nouveau collections
• Take part in a Partage Plus-related event