Cigar or bar cabinet

In 1961, the furniture collection of the Museum of Applied Arts was enriched by a highly significant ensemble of art objects: approximately thirty pieces from the collection of samples amassed by the Budapest furniture manufacturer Miksa Schmidt (1861–1935), who was of Austrian descent. The most notable part of the material was represented by especially fine decorative furniture by artists of the Vienna Sezession group – which had been created in 1897 by young artists reacting against the official historicist art –, as well as by small pieces of furniture from outstanding masters of French Art Nouveau. One of these pieces is this cabinet, which was designed by Koloman Moser (1868–1918), a leading personality in the group, who dealt with graphic and applied arts design and who a few years later was a founder member of the Wiener Werkstatte, a key applied arts workshop of the time around 1900. The construction of his furniture is already unusual: a double, stand-like base supports the cube-shaped body, which inside, in the middle, is divided into two halves by a mirror. On each of the two sides opposite are two doors, with a concealed lock. Nevertheless, the main peculiarity of the piece is inlay, executed to an extremely high standard, covering the entire body in rows of symmetrical motifs. The piece – or an analogous example of it – featured in the eighth Sezession exhibition in 1900, an account of which appeared in issue no. 3 of the volume that year of the periodical Ver Sacrum, which promoted the endeavours and works of the group.