Gustav Klimt Bk of Postcards
Category: Books,Arts & Photography,Individual Artists
Gustav Klimt Bk of Postcards Details
About the Author Gustav Klimt (Austrian, 1862 1918) is the most famous of the Viennese Secessionists and one of the leading painters of Art Nouveau. From his earliest paintings, Klimt disclosed the persistent themes of his art: the longings and fears of the human psyche. His sensual paintings are as alluring today as they were to his contemporaries. This book of postcards presents a sumptuous selection of his masterful oils and murals. 30 full-color reproductions. Read more
Reviews
There is more to Gustav Klimt than just "The Kiss", but, really, if that had been all he ever painted, that might have been enough. Pre-WWI, Klimt was the toast of Vienna society and "the" portrait painter in demand. This postcard set includes two of his portraits of socialite Adele Bloch-Bauer, including the wonderful "Lady in Gold", all gold and richness. If you aren't familiar with this painting, I highly recommend the episode about its theft in the wonderful series Art of the Heist (which even has "Lady in Gold" on its cover).This images in this set have sometimes been a little truncated for the postcard (such as with "The Kiss"), and sometimes only a detail is shown (such as the cover art, a detail from "Medicine"). The image quality is quite good, keeping in mind that a regular photo cannot do justice to a Klimt where he used metals, including gold leaf. I thought four images were downright dark in their postcard reproductions, but then some Klimt designs were created on a dark tan background. There are five explicit nudes, in case you're wondering. The post office won't care if you send them, so it's just if the images bother you.The message/address side of the postcard gives artwork information, such as the name & dimensions of the artwork, the media used, and where it currently makes its home. Images range from portraits to landscapes to decorations.Twenty of the postcards are of oil paintings (some are what I'd call boring landscapes). Nine are tempura and watercolor, and eight of those, according to the postcard descriptions, use metal of some kind, including golf leaf. I'm not sure why the gold leaf is mentioned on these 8 items and not on the oil paintings with gold leaf. It took months for Klimt to complete some portraits, such as "Adele Bloch-Bauer I" (also known as "Lady in Gold") because of the painstaking gold leaf application.Each postcard measures a little less each way than 6 ½" x 4 ¾". Postcard postage is needed. The postard arrive in a stack of perforated cards. I found that a card can be taken out from the middle of the pack if I was very careful, and first folded the card back & forth across the perforated line.Pomegranate did a nice job on this set, 4.5 stars rounded up to 5.Happy Reader
