Klimt by Gilles Neret (Hardcover)

The unfading popularity of Gustav Klimt (1862 1918) attests not only to the particular appeal of his luxuriant painting but also to the universal themes with which he worked: love, feminine beauty, ageing, and death.

The son of a goldsmith, Klimt created surfaces of ornate and jewel-like luminosity which show influence of both Egyptian and Japanese art. Through paintings, murals, and friezes, his work is defined by radiant colour, fluid lines, floral elements, and mosaic-like patterning.

With a number of subjects dealing with sensuality and desire as well as anxiety and despair, all this iridescence is also suffused with feeling. Klimt's numerous images of women, characterized by curvaceous forms, tender flesh, red lips and flushed cheeks, were particularly charged with passion, at a time when such frank eroticism was still taboo in Viennese upper-middle-class society.

This book presents a selection of Klimt's work, introducing his pictorial world of decoration and desire, as well as his influence on artists to come.

96 pages
Casebound hardcover
Full colour

About the Series:
Each book in TASCHEN s Basic Art series features: a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance, a concise biography, approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions