Wednesday, 13 December 2006

Gustav Klimt's The Kiss Re-interpreted


Painted Background Fabric


The beginning of the painting


Finshed Painting

Click on the image to see the detail
Finished Quilted Fabric Postcard

Whew...I really procrastinated on this one, and I'm not sure why. I think, I was challenged by how I was going to do this one, so I stalled. Once, I started painting, however, I liked how the progress was coming along. And, now that it's sitting here in front of me, I really like the outcome, if I may say so myself!

It's not an exact replica, but close enough. This is 4.3 x 6 inches, painted, quilted and assembled into a fabric postcard.

I have to run to my daughter's swim lessons right now, so this will have to be it for this afternoon.

Dec. 14th update: Since I didn't have enough time to write much yesterday, I decided to add a little more to the post...mainly background info on Klimt. He was 1 of 7 children born to a poor family in Austria. He attended Vienna School of Arts and Crafts from 1879-1883 and was an early member of the the Austrian Symbolist group which was an off shoot of the Romantics (think Casper David Friedrich, John Henry Fuseli. Other symbolists include Odilon Redon, Puvais de Chavannes and Edvard Munch.

Klimt was publicly criticized for his almost pornographic and sensuous paintings. While not pornographic in a modern sense, the phallic symbol is alive and well in a lot of his work...just look at The Kiss, it's there!

His drew inspiration from ancient Greek, Minoan and Byzantine art work and engravings by Alrecht Durer. After reading this, I ticked off a number of my own favorite artists, Redon, Friedrich and Munch. And, Durer is the bomb when it comes to printmaking! I think I have to pull out my 19th C Art History book after I sign off!

After I made this mini replica, I must have stared at it for at least 30 minutes or longer. The figures merge, yet they are dileneated by the patterns on their clothing, he has large geometric masculine shapes in black, gold, white, copper and she has smaller round shapes in all of the above colors with the addition of red, blue, and green. I might not have noticed if I hadn't studied the painting and painted a copy. It got me thinking about shapes, colors and the idea of frequencies. I'm going to explore that theme in more detail on a larger scale in my own work!