Where the 1960s "psychedelic" look came from

If someone showed you these album covers, or these posters... Even if you've never heard of the bands featured, you can probably guess what kind of music they play. This style has become synonymous with the

psychedelic

'60s. But these abstract shapes and curly, barely legible letters were not created in the

1960s

. They come from a celebrated art movement, which began almost a century earlier. At the end of the 19th century, new technologies (electric power, telephones, automobiles) were changing the way the world worked. And the way he

look

ed. And some people, especially artists, who lived through this technological revolution...were not that interested in the new industry.

To be frank, they thought I was ugly. From this conflict a new global art movement was born that went by many different names. Like the secessionists in Austria and the Glasgow school in Scotland. But you may know it as: Art Nouveau, which literally means "new art" in French. Its creators wanted to make art that reflected the vitality of city life. They used flat decorative patterns, female figures and organic and vegetal motifs, often stylized with fluid and abstract shapes. And they applied this new visual language to almost everything, from architecture to paintings, textiles and more. Because they believed that aesthetics should go hand in hand with utility.

And no object was too mundane to be beautiful. Like this entrance to the Paris metro. Or these posters by Alphonse Mucha, advertising champagne and cookies, and trying as much to be beautiful as to convey information. Okay, back to the hippies. Like the late 19th century, the

1960s

were a time of cultural upheaval. ARCHIVE: “The Vietnam struggle continues” ARCHIVE: “We want the Beatles” ARCHIVE: “The Beatles for everyone” In the United States, the epicenter of this change was San Francisco,

where

hundreds of thousands of young people

came

to the city. For things like protests, drum circles, and of course concerts.

Lots, lots, lots of concerts. In particular, dance concerts, featuring trippy,

psychedelic

music from bands like Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead. And there was one important way to get people to come to your concert: a good poster. Back then, these now-iconic bands were just getting started, playing back-to-back shows at venues like the Fillmore and the Avalon. And to advertise this new generation of hippie bands, those places knew that simple font and a grayscale photo just didn't work. to cut it. So they commissioned work from a small group of artists, who developed a completely new formula for concert posters.

One that was inspired by a variety of established design traditions: comics, surrealism and, of course, art nouveau. By the mid-60s, art nouveau was already experiencing something of a resurgence. Especially when it

came

to textiles: the dynamic floral designs fit perfectly with the hippie aesthetic. That's probably why, in 1965, a museum on the outskirts of San Francisco opened this exhibition. Legend has it that this is

where

some of those designers were first introduced to Art Nouveau. One designer, Wes Wilson, told Time magazine that he admired her "idea of ​​actually publishing it." And when they started making new concert posters, these designers took those basic elements of art nouveau and turned up the dial.

Art Nouveau is famous for its female figures, usually nude, with loose hair and a "come hither"

look

. A style that psychedelic designers clearly captured. Look at the way these posters are covered edge to edge with detailed two-dimensional illustrations. In particular, abstract flowers and curves, and also peacocks: that's also something art nouveau. They... loved peacocks. And sometimes, psychedelic designers used images taken directly from an art nouveau poster, but always with a radically different color palette. Instead of the soft pastels of art nouveau. psychedelic artists opted for intense, high-contrast colors, which are said to make the eyes "vibrate"; a reference to the "visual experiences of an LSD user." And that curly, muddy, barely legible font?

It all started here... in a 1902 poster by Austrian designer Alfred Roller. In the '60s, artists adapted the bold, dynamic typeface and took it even further: softening its lines and darkening its edges. Making it almost unreadable. Which served a purpose. It was meant to grab your attention and keep you interested, at least for as long as it took to figure out what the sign was trying to tell you. The result was a bunch of posters that looked like art nouveau on acid. As San Francisco music spread around the world, so did the aesthetics. Partly because posters are easy to own, reproduce and collect.

Sometimes fans tear them down immediately after installation. The artists behind them even became celebrities in their own right: some of them got their own spread in Life magazine. The posters they made (their vibrant colors and sinuous lines) capture the energy of the 1960s. Like the art nouveau ones, they represent the late 19th century. And although these two periods do not perfectly reflect each other, both movements were able to create something that captured the feeling of a changing world. And his art reflects that.