to express my very sincere thanks. I would also like to thank all the bent- 
wood historians involved in this project-my co-curator and -author Wolf 
gang Thillmann in particular-whose systematic research and scientific 
meticulousness have helped lead us to many important findings concern- 
ing the development of bentwood furniture in recent years and made it 
possible to correct many false attributions which were often enough in 
line with the interests of the art market. Much is still to be explored and 
evaluated in the field of “Thonetology,” but some aspects will probably 
still remain in the dark in the future: Especially in the area of attributions 
there are still many ambiguities-partly because until the Post-War Period 
the producers of bentwood usually attached little value to making the 
designers of their furniture public. 
Although the economic importance of bentwood furniture in the furniture 
market has declined since the second half of the 20th Century to the 
extent that its importance to the history of art has increased for museums, 
it is by no means a closed chapter in furniture history. The Companies 
Thonet in Germany, Gebrüder Thonet Vienna in Italy, and TON in the 
Czech Republic now regularly collaborate with international designers 
in order to expand their product ränge with sophisticated designs. But 
also for many Companies that are not specialized in bent wood, as well 
as for many freelance designers and artists, the subject of bentwood fur 
niture is a constant challenge: In the context of traditional consciousness 
and innovation potential, the poles are formed on the one hand by prod- 
ucts that can assert themselves on the Commodity market, and on the 
other hand by objects that reveal their technological, typological, and 
aesthetic conditions in a previously unfamiliar way. At best, it is possible 
to reconcile the two aspects. 
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