This class discusses important avant artistic figures (painters, designers, architects. etc) in Vienna during the late 1800s and 1900s. The 1890s and the early 1900s are fascinating periods, because these are times of great social, political and economic changes. We are going to focus on Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele, Josef Hoffmann and Josef Maria Olbrich in context of the Vienna during the Belle Epoche, a tumultuous, decadent time that hides the social unrest with its booming exchange of ideas and culture. We will also make connections to other movements of the same time period such as the Pre-Raphaelite movement and the Art Nouveau movement in order to see the Vienna Secession as a part of a pan European (if not global) occurrence: The birth of the Modern Era.