Visited the Klimt exhibition at Liverpool Tate yesterday.
Klimt's often painterly style with its dominating geometric patterns and compressed flattened spaces was influenced by the decorative arts (he studied at the fine arts academy and his father was a gold engraver). Other influences come from his keen interest in Byzantine mosaics, Japanese prints and Chinese paintings.
Klimt's earlier works comprise drawings and painting that are almost neoclassical in theme. This is eventually transformed into a more expressionist style as space and form are abandoned and his figures become more distorted and exaggerated. Klimt became a major influence on later Expressionist painters. Klimt's paintings also express his love for geometric form. This is perhaps most evident in his square landscapes, but also noticeable in how his male figures tend to be represented as rectilinear shapes, whereas his female figures are often rounded and flowing.
Slightly disappointingly this is not purely a retrospective of Klimt's work. The exhibition also includes work by some of the other artists and designers who formed part of the Viennese Secession and the Weiner Werkstatte movements. The latter was strongly influenced by the British Arts and Crafts movement and as such, there are some illustrations of design work by Glasgow's Charles Rennie Mackintosh. Most prominent among the other Viennese artists is the designer Kolomon Moser, the painter Carl Moll and especially the architect and designer Josef Hoffmann. There are some striking examples of furniture and smaller household items. In particular I remember being impressed by an eloquent decorative card table and a very snazzy set of cutlery designed by Hoffman. The cutlery and many of the other objects were produced by the Weiner Werkstatte, who promoted the idea of the 'total environment', in which art enhances all aspects of life. To my mind Klimt's involvement in this is less convincing than say the work of Mackintosh or indeed William Morris. I wanted the show to celebrate Klimt the painter and this was a mildly interesting distraction.
Klimt's artworks are displayed in ten room settings. Some of the rooms are designed to give and idea of the original environments from where the artworks came. These were the homes and buildings of Klimt's patrons: Fritz and Lili Waerndorfer; the Wittgenstein family; Otto and Eugenia Primavesi. As such, you will find paintings reunited with the furniture and objects they originally accompanied.
If you want to see Klimt's most iconic painting 'The Kiss' you'll have to travel to the Belvedere gallery in Vienna to see it, although it's probably already been seen by many in a thousand student bedsits and art shops. Another absent work is 'Judith and Holofernes' 1901, one of Klimt's spectacular gold paintings. It presents a similar theme to Judith II that is included in this exhibition. Perhaps understandably you will not see the 1907 "Portrait of Adèle Bloch-Bauer", purchased for $135m (£68.4m) a couple of years ago by a New York gallery owner. It was the most expensive painting in history at the time of its purchase. I still feel a little cheated and disappointed by the absence of such paintings.
One important thing to note about Klimt's existing work is that possibly his greatest paintings no longer exist. A collection of 13 paintings were purposely destroyed by fire at the Immendorf Castle in southern Austria in 1945. Ironically the paintings had initially been stored there by the Third Reich in order to preserve them from air raids over Vienna, but after the death of Hitler an SS unit decided to destroy the works in order to prevent them falling into the hands of the encroaching Russians. These paintings included three of Klimt's greatest and most influential works: Philosophy, Jurisprudence and Medicine.
One reason given for the absence of certain works, apart from their value, is that the paintings are in such a fragile state that it would have been too risky to transport them. For this reason it is unlikely that so much of Klimt's work will ever be exhibited together again - making this exhibition a once in a lifetime experience.
It is worth saying that the exhibition graphics that greet you at the entrance are quite stunning. The low relief gold typography and pattern work are redolent of the sumptuousness of Klimt at his best. The first room of the exhibition is on the ground floor and displays a full-scale reconstruction of the Beethoven Frieze (the original is on permanent view at the Vienna Secession). I was not aware that it was a replica of the original as it is quite easy to walk in and not realise this. It was a monumental installation created by Klimt in 1902, celebrating his idea of Gesamtkunstwerk (the total work of art). Klimt's interest in trying to represent music in painting was influenced by Friedrich Nietzsche's 1872 book The Birth of Tragedy that espoused the idea of music as the purest art form because of its unique ability to stir the deepest felt passions and to stimulate the very core of human consciousness. The Beethoven Frieze is a fantastic work of art and even as a replica is one of the highlights of the show.
Further on there is one room dedicated to Klimt's landscape paintings in square format. These are quite beautiful paintings that evoke a sense of calm and tranquillity. Some are impressionist in style whilst others lean towards expressionism. Their enchantingly cropped compositions offer a somewhat quirky but assured view of the world.
This is the final part of the exhibition that includes a main room open to all and an adjoining gallery of erotic line drawings that is only accessible to those over eighteen. The main room contains some of Klimt's greatest paintings in this exhibition including; "The Three Ages" 1905 showing the cycle of life - one of Klimt's most important themes - represented in the form of three female figures: the child, the mother and the older woman. A quite stunning image and my own personal favourite.
I was slightly disappointed by the explicit erotic drawings in the adjoining gallery as the room is quite dark and each drawing is rather dimly lit. Some of the drawings consist of very faint lines and it is hard to make out what's depicted unless you lean over and peer close. Some of these drawings were published in books at the time - one is displayed in the centre of the room - others were exhibited for the first time in 1910 and not surprisingly shocked the establishment and led to accusations of Klimt being a pornographer. However, it must be remembered that one of Klimt's contemporaries was Sigmund Freud whose published works about the subconscious suggested for the first time that the primary goal of sex was pleasure. Some of these drawings, of which Klimt made many thousands, can be seen as the artists own explorations in this area.
