Dance Card to an Architects' Ball > Dance Card to an Architects' Ball
This dance card from the "Ball der Architekten" of Vienna is dated January 24, 1898. In addition to the paper cover, shown here, the brass wire form holds four folded postcards with space for messages. On the hook of the dance card, a grimacing face is set into the elements of an ionic capital. The postcards have Art Nouveau designs and bear the greeting "NACHRICHTEN VOM BALL DER ARCHITEKTEN," or "News from the Architects' Ball."
One of these cards has an image of a pavilion that is signed by Alois Ludwig (1872-1969), an Austrian architect who was a student of Otto Wagner. With Wagner, Ludwig helped design the ornamented facade of the Majolikahaus in Vienna (1898), a major monument of the Viennese Secession.
At Avery, other memorabilia from architects' dances include a photograph from the Beaux Arts Ball, the annual ball of the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris.
