"Muster Nr. 2000" fish fork

Progressive architect Joseph Maria Olbrich was one of the founders of the Vienna Secession, along with Gustav Klimt, Koloman Moser, and Josef Hoffmann. One of Olbrich’s most famous—and at the time most controversial—buildings was his Secession Hall of 1897, where participating modern artists displayed their work in a series of regular exhibitions. While derided as “the golden cabbage” for its gilded, foliate spherical cap, its bold form became an icon of the new artistic movement and remains one of the city’s landmarks. Widely published, Olbrich’s work had a profound influence upon the artistic legacy of Vienna, brought to the United States directly through examples seen in the German and Austrian displays at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair.

**Excerpt from**

Samantha Robinson, Label text (2009.32.5.1-2), Conservation Galleries, 2014.