Jutta Sika (17 September 1877 – 2 January 1964) was an Austrian graphic designer, artist, fashion designer, and an educator.

Early life and education

Sika was born on 17 September 1877 in

Linz Linz (Pronunciation: , ; ) is the capital of Upper Austria and List of cities and towns in Austria, third-largest city in Austria. Located on the river Danube, the city is in the far north of Austria, south of the border with the Czech Repub ...

, Austria. Her father, Alfred Sika, had worked as an inspector for the state-controlled railway system. Around the same year that she was born, the family moved to

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

. Sika had always had an interest in the arts and in 1895, she began to pursue her studies at the Graphische Lehr- und Versuchsanstalt in Vienna. She remained there for two years before continuing her education at the School of Applied Arts, where she went to study costume design from 1897 to 1902 and then returning from 1913 to 1914.

Career

Sika was one of the founding members of "Wiener Kunst im Hause", a group formed in 1901 that was composed of former students who had attended Kunstgewerbeschule Wien. This group then rebranded itself as

Wiener Werkstätte The Wiener Werkstätte ("Vienna Workshop"), established in 1903 by the graphic designer and painter Koloman Moser, the architect Josef Hoffmann and the patron Fritz Waerndorfer, was a productive association in Vienna, Austria that brought to ...

, shifting their attention towards creating ''

Gesamtkunstwerk A ''Gesamtkunstwerk'' (, 'total work of art', 'ideal work of art', 'universal artwork', 'synthesis of the arts', 'comprehensive artwork', or 'all-embracing art form') is a work of art that makes use of all or many art forms or strives to do so. ...

'', a unified system that embraced the concept of a total work of art and all around a unified design for interiors. Sika was also a skilled ceramicist and glass designer working for well-known ceramics and glass manufacturers. Later she went on to design women's fashion for multiple fashion firms, creating accessories and embroidery designs for Austrian fashion brands such as Schwestern Flöge and Wiener Stickerei. She then worked as a graphic designer, working for a Christmas tree decoration firm, tea packaging and making postcards. In 1920, she began to put all of her energy towards paintings when she developed an interest in creating floral subjects. She also worked as a teacher, becoming a professor for a drawing class at Gewerbliche Fortbildungschule in Vienna from 1911 to 1933. During the Second World War she spent the remainder of her time teaching at an girls' secondary school. She died on 2 January 1964 in

Work

Many of Sika's works are in the collections of museums in the United States including the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...

, the

Art Institute of Chicago The Art Institute of Chicago, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the United States. The museum is based in the Art Institute of Chicago Building in Chicago's Grant Park (Chicago), Grant Park. Its collection, stewa ...

, and the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of larg ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sika, Jutta 20th-century Austrian artists 20th-century Austrian educators 20th-century Austrian women artists 20th-century ceramists 20th-century women educators Artists from Linz Austrian ceramists Austrian fashion designers Austrian graphic designers Austrian women ceramists Wiener Werkstätte Austrian women fashion designers Austrian women graphic designers 1877 births 1964 deaths