This is Gaudis's 'confident' armchair(s), made around 1905 for Casa Batlló (A wealthy industrialist's House in Barcelona). The angle of the seats allowed sitters to have close and intimate conversations without being directly face to face.
Some of the inspiration/ references that I think are in this piece are;
Nature: The flowing, organic shapes of the chairs resemble the forms of plants, trees, and even animal forms. For instance, the curved backs of these seats are like the smooth shapes of leaves or branches, and the arm supports and back base are a similar shape to bones and skeletal structures.
Human anatomy: Human proportions and ergonomic comfort is clearly a huge part of this design: the backrests curve gently to fit the contours of the human body, the seats are concaved for comfort and the shape of the backsplats allow for sitters to rest their heads on each others' shoulders.
Art Nouveau Movement: Gaudi was designing this chair at the same time as the Art Nouveau movement, which was characterised by stylised organic forms and an integration of art and design. This confident clearly blur the line between functional objects and sculpture.
Queen Anne period: the shape of the legs is reminiscent of the spade feet that were popular in the Queen Anne period and Chippendale period. Also the minimal ornamentation and rejection of straight lines.
Louis XV: the rococo style used lots of these conversation chairs, because furniture design began to focus more on comfort and social interaction. They were also popular in the Victorian era, especially for courting couples.
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