Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
first recorded 1901, French, literally "new art" (see novel (adj.)). Called in German Jugendstil.
Wiktionary
alt. A decorative style of art and architecture that especially used the sinuous and flowing lines of plants. n. A decorative style of art and architecture that especially used the sinuous and flowing lines of plants.
WordNet
n. a French school of art and architecture popular in the 1890s; characterized by stylized natural forms and sinuous outlines of such objects as leaves and vines and flowers
Wikipedia
Art Nouveau (, Anglicised to ) is an international style of art, architecture and applied art – especially the decorative arts – that was most popular between 1890–1910. A reaction to academic art of the 19th century, it was inspired by natural forms and structures, not only in flowers and plants, but also in curved lines. Architects tried to harmonize with the natural environment.
English uses the French name Art Nouveau ("new art"), but the style has many different names in other languages: in Austria – Secessionsstil after Wiener Secession, Spanish Modernismo, Catalan Modernisme, Czech Secese, Danish Skønvirke or Jugendstil, in Germany – Jugendstil, Art nouveau or Reformstil, Hungarian Szecesszió, Italian L'Art Nouveau, Stile floreale or Stile Liberty, Norwegian Jugendstil, Polish Secesja, Slovak Secesia, Russian Модерн [Modern] , Swedish Jugend.
Art Nouveau is considered a "total" art style, embracing architecture, graphic art, interior design, and most of the decorative arts including jewellery, furniture, textiles, household silver and other utensils and lighting, as well as the fine arts. According to the philosophy of the style, art should be a way of life. For many well-off Europeans, it was possible to live in an art nouveau-inspired house with art nouveau furniture, silverware, fabrics, ceramics including tableware, jewellery, cigarette cases, etc. Artists desired to combine the fine arts and applied arts, even for utilitarian objects.
Although Art Nouveau was replaced by 20th-century Modernist styles, it is now considered as an important transition between the eclectic historic revival styles of the 19th century and Modernism.
Usage examples of "art nouveau".
The one who understood the rich pleasure of buying an art nouveau bottle for no more reason than seeing it sit on a shelf.
He walked to the Art Nouveau print and took it off the hook, slid the metal plate aside, and peered through the aperture.
He buys art nouveau posters and a paperback of Guevara's writings.
Style was added by a scattering of Art Nouveau, in the bronzed lamp shaped like a long, slim woman, and the sinuous etched flowers on the glass doors of a curio cabinet displaying a collection of antique beaded bags.
It was art nouveau long, long before nouveau was new on Old Earth.
He was dangling near the top of a beautifully preserved chamber with rounded, polished tile walls adorned with intricate, colorfully enameled Art Nouveau mosaics.
Aglifc lived in the Piazzale Susa area: a little secluded street, a turn-of-the-century building, soberly art nouveau.
Off to the right, she sees an enormous Art Nouveau train station, a survival from an earlier era still, but on a scale to dwarf London's grandest.
There were no glass awnings, no strings of bulbs, no Art Nouveau balustrades behind which to hide an envelope.
When Annie Pohaku appeared on the blue carpet in the fluted chrome art nouveau doorway at the end of the Nix Olympica Bar, she was framed unself-consciously for an instant in the vertical beam of the entrance ceiling lights.
Then she put the tray down on the art nouveau iron and lacquer coffee table.