Joseph Maria Olbrich

Vienna Secession Pavilion.

Ornament for Olbrich.

Joseph Maria Olbrich (December 22, 1867 – August 8, 1908) was an architect and industrial designer born in Opava, Austro-Hungarian Empire (present-day Czech Republic).

He founded the Viennese nonconformist movement, along with Josef Hoffmann (1870-1956). At the beginning of this modernism appears Otto Wagner (1841-1918), father of this movement. Wagner will also have a type of architecture that will react against historicism, in which a liberation of the traditional types of architecture will be seen. Although he tries to impregnate his work with rationalism, he will continue to depend on the ornamental.

In August 2008, the Austrian Post issued a postage stamp commemorating the 100th anniversary of his death, illustrated with a maple mailbox designed by Olbrich for the villa of businessman Max Friedmann in Hinterbrühl, which has stood since the 1970s in the Municipal Art Collection (Städtische Kunstsammlung) of Darmstadt.