The Kiss by Gustav Klimt: Great Art Explained — Transcript

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1. 0:08By the end of the 19th century Vienna, an uptight,  stuffy and conservative city was changing.
2. 0:15A group of artists, architects, musicians and social  scientists were experimenting in ways which would
3. 0:22transform their individual fields. On the one hand  Vienna was the traditional city of academic art,
4. 0:29Johann Strauss and the Habsburg empire, but on  the other, it was the home of radical artists
5. 0:36such as Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele, who were  shocking audiences with explorations of sexual themes.
6. 0:43Architects Otto Wagner and Adolf Loos were  challenging imperial design, while Gustav Mahler
7. 0:50was transforming the musical life of the city.  And Sigmund Freud was about to change forever
8. 0:57the way we think about the human mind.  Vienna was experiencing a new 'golden age'.
9. 1:05It was a city at the forefront of modernity, and it would shape the 20th century.
10. 1:34In 1857 Emperor Franz Josef ordered the  building of the Ringstrasse. It is a series
11. 1:41of tree-lined boulevards that circled the city.  The Bourgeoisie of Vienna rushed to build huge
12. 1:47mansions on the Ringstrasse alongside new  public buildings. These ostentatious palaces
13. 1:54needed to be decorated and Gustav Klimt and  his brother were very successful mural painters.
14. 2:02Gustav Klimt became one of the world's most famous  artists without the usual personality cult we expect.
15. 2:10We know very little about him except that  he never married but was a prodigious lover and
16. 2:14left behind 14 children by as many women. He lived  with his mother his whole life and was terrified
17. 2:21of mental illness. Almost a classic case study for  Sigmund Freud. And like Freud he placed sexuality
18. 2:28at the forefront of his work. Klimt didn't go to  a fine arts school, but rather an arts and crafts school.
19. 2:36A more practical education, where he learned  skills and techniques. His lifetime goal was to
20. 2:41demolish the snobby distinction between fine art  and craft. At the age of 20, Klimt and his younger
21. 2:47brother were creating allegorical murals for the  new public buildings in Vienna. Their friezes were
22. 2:53conservative mythological images - in keeping with  19th century academic painting. But it is in his
23. 3:00background as a decorative artist, that we find  the roots of Klimt's later more radical work.
24. 3:07When both his brother and father died suddenly,  Klimt's art would take a dramatic and darker turn.
25. 3:14He would still use allegory and symbolism, but he  would transform it into a new language that was
26. 3:19more overtly sexual and for some more disturbing.  He was commissioned to decorate the university of
27. 3:26Vienna. The paintings would cause a huge public  scandal with their sexually provocative themes
28. 3:32and Klimt was accused of producing pornography.  Women were advised to stay away from his work and
29. 3:39the paintings were rejected by the university.  Klimt formed a radical new society called the
30. 3:45Vienna Secession with other young artists. Their  aim was to bring art, craft, architecture and design
31. 3:52together - in one great movement. The secession  broke away from the pompous historical painting
32. 3:58fashionable in the late 19th century, and gave  contemporary art its first dedicated space.
33. 4:09In a nation still very traditional this can be
34. 4:12seen as the formal beginning  of modern art in Austria.
35. 4:18Ironically, a painting that is seen as a romantic  ideal by man, was painted by a man who was never
36. 4:24romantically involved and was afraid of intimacy.  A man who had an obsession with sex, bedded most of
37. 4:31his models - as well as his subjects - but went  home each night to the mother he adored and
38. 4:37two unmarried sisters. The painting is square - at six foot by six foot, it is practically life-size,
39. 4:44making us connect to it on a human scale.  It is self-contained and deceptively simple.
40. 4:50It shows Klimt as the consummate draftsman,  an artist who drew every day from life models.
41. 4:57There are several things which make  the kiss unique - the deliberate contrast
42. 5:02between the realistically rendered flesh and the  two-dimensional abstract ornamentation, creates
43. 5:07an effect almost like photo montage. The bodies  are painted with a cool contemporary sensuality.
44. 5:14They are encased like an ancient Egyptian  mummy in cascades of gold and abstract patterns.
45. 5:19And everything appears to float in a golden  cosmos - outside of time and space. The background
46. 5:27is Klimt's new technical invention. He covered the  entire canvas with sheets of gold leaf and then
47. 5:32painted over the gold with a dark wash, which  he then flicked with flakes of gold on top.
48. 5:39If we look at where the background  meets the meadow - which is primed
49. 5:42in the conventional way - we can see how the  artist was playing with different textures .
50. 5:48He used eight different types of gold in The Kiss.  He also builds up texture underneath the gold leaf
51. 5:54to give it a three-dimensional aspect - to catch  the light - in the same way Byzantine mosaics do.
52. 6:01It is gold that we think of when we think of  Klimt. His father was a goldsmith and Klimt had
53. 6:06a lifelong fascination with the precious metal.  He traveled to Ravenna to see the Byzantine mosaics,
54. 6:12a major influence on his 'Golden period.' The Kiss, with the dazzling glow of an altarpiece
55. 6:19has become an icon for the post-religious age, and  the Gold surrounding them almost hints at a halo.
56. 6:27Gold leaf is fragile and comes in gossamer thin  sheets. For the relief sections Klimt would use
57. 6:33gesso, which is a mixture of animal glue and chalk  dust. He would paint the thick mixture on in the
58. 6:39required pattern and then apply the gold leaf.  The excess was then discarded. Apart from Gold,
59. 6:47the other precious metal we see here looks like silver,  but is in fact Platinum, more expensive than Gold
60. 6:53but unlike Silver it doesn't Oxidise. There is more  pure Gold than you think in The Kiss. If we look
61. 7:00at this ultraviolet scan. All of the parts which  are dark, including the background, have a layer of
62. 7:06pure Gold leaf - only the white patches reveal where  there is no Gold. Even after applying Gold leaf to
63. 7:13the surface we can see how Klimt is happy to paint  over the gold and mix both materials and textures.
64. 7:20He doesn't use Gold for its realistic qualities. It is too shiny and reflective of light - but rather as
65. 7:27an object of desire. Gold is an indicator of  wealth, and its resistance to tarnishing has
66. 7:33ensured it was used to decorate the tombs of  Gods and in religious paintings for centuries.
67. 7:39Klimt uses Gold to confer status on the Nouveau  rRche women of Vienna - to suggest opulence, wealth
68. 7:46and beauty. The theme was not new but the overt  eroticism was. Klimt knew Edvard Munch's painting
69. 7:53from over 10 years before, and both artists  were aware of Rodin's even earlier sculpture.
70. 8:00The first time Klimt painted an embrace, he shows  a romantic couple about to kiss. The artist who
71. 8:06avoided any form of romantic relationship,  places the disembodied figures of old-age,
72. 8:12disease and death above the young couple. Passion  he tells us, is fraught with uncertainty.
73. 8:19The Beethoven frieze was part of a successful group  show of the Secessionists inspired by Beethoven's
74. 8:259th symphony. A watershed in both Vienna's  AND Klimt's artistic evolution. The freieze by
75. 8:31Klimt features an embracing couple, similar in both  composition and aesthetics to The Kiss.
76. 8:38'Love' here is surrounded by demonic creatures. The Stoclet frieze, a privately commissioned mosaic, features
77. 8:45an embrace of an erotic nature - a similar motif to  The Kiss. As in the Stoclet frieze, Klimt suggests
78. 8:52the couple in the kiss are naked under their  garments. It is worth reminding ourselves what the
79. 8:58average Viennese couple were wearing at the time,  to understand why it was considered so provocative.
80. 9:05Klimt was an admirer of Aubrey Beardsley, and the  clothes were inspired by his Art Nouveau style,
81. 9:11as well as the organic forms  of 'The Arts and Crafts Movement.'
82. 9:15The clothes are a visual metaphor for the  emotional and physical expression of erotic love.
83. 9:21His robe is emblazoned with upright black  rectangles, a symbol of thrusting masculinity.
84. 9:28Her robe is studied with whirls and spirals said to  symbolize the Ova. I don't think it's an accident
85. 9:36that the shape of the entwined couple is itself  a Golden Phallic symbol. Klimt's figures often
86. 9:42have a stiff 'statue-like' appearance, and he was  said to be inspired by the Belgian sculptor George Minne,
87. 9:48who used what was called the perfect "Gothic" body - slim, expressive and youthful. Minne was also
88. 9:55influential for younger Austrian artists like Egon  Schiele and Oscar Kokoshka - both followers of Klimt.
89. 10:03Like Monet and van Gogh, Klimt collected Japanese  prints, which were hugely influential. 'Japonisme' can
90. 10:10be seen in the very simplified composition, but  also in the tight cropping - with the man's head
91. 10:16painted very close to the top of the canvas.  A departure from traditional Western art.
92. 10:22Klimt's complicated feelings towards 'love'  come out in The Kiss, and the figures are
93. 10:27pictured on a patch of flowery meadow BUT  they are teetering at the edge of a cliff.
94. 10:34Despite the religious comparisons with icons,  the lovers, with garlands in their hair, have a
95. 10:39distinctly 'pagan' look. The man wears a crown of  vines and the woman wears a crown of flowers,
96. 10:46suggesting that this is the consummation  of some kind of ritual. One theory is that
97. 10:53in this picture Klimt is representing the myth  of Apollo and Daphne from Ovid's metamorphosis.
98. 11:00Most artists when depicting the story show the  moment Daphne is running from Apollo, as she begs
99. 11:05the Gods to transform her into a Laurel tree, to  protect her from Apollo's advances. But the last
100. 11:12paragraph of Metamorphosis refers specifically  to "a kiss" AFTER she has transformed into a tree,
101. 11:18which is rarely portrayed. The legs of the woman  in The Kiss seem to be sinking into the ground,
102. 11:25as tendrils of Golden Laurel leaves, emanating  from her body, root themselves into the meadow,
103. 11:31and suggest Daphne's transformation into a Laurel  tree. The man's face is not shown to the viewer.
104. 11:38Klimt almost exclusively painted women, and when  men did feature in his paintings they were just an
105. 11:44accessory. He is bent downwards to press a kiss to  the woman's cheek, and his hands are cradling the
106. 11:50woman's face, which is turned towards the viewer,  Her eyes are closed like a trance or in ecstasy.
107. 11:57She has one arm wrapped around the man's neck,  the other resting gently on his hand, and her face
108. 12:04is upturned to receive the man's kiss... or is it?  One of the great mysteries of The Kiss is who
109. 12:12are the models? It is suggested that this  is a portrait of Klimt and Emilie Flöge.
110. 12:19She was a businesswoman, and an avant-garde  fashion designer. A woman way ahead of her
111. 12:24time, and a companion to Klimt for 27 years.  It seems that the relationship may have begun
112. 12:31as an infatuation - on his part. But matured  into an extremely close friendship that was
113. 12:36intellectually and emotionally intimate rather  than physical. The actual life model was more
114. 12:42likely to be a woman known as "Red Hilda" who she  bears a strong resemblance to. She was the model
115. 12:48for many of his paintings and one of Klimt's many  lovers. There has been endless debate about what
116. 12:54exactly is the relationship between the couple.  Is it romantic? Is she bending to receive the kiss
117. 13:00or turning away? If we do take it as an allegorical  portrait of Klimt and Flöge, then the ambiguity
118. 13:07of the relationship in the painting is a perfect  reflection of their own ambiguous relationship.
119. 13:14The man tries to kiss her but she turns her head  away, there is a tenderness there an acceptance
120. 13:19of affection, but she is not compliant. Her eyes  and mouth are firmly closed - unusual for Klimt's
121. 13:26paintings, where the woman often has an open  'sexualized' mouth. Could The Kiss, long thought
122. 13:32to be the most romantic painting in history,  actually be a depiction of a platonic relationship?
123. 13:40When it was shown in Vienna, it was immediately  bought by the Austrian government. Klimt's work,
124. 13:46once considered pornographic and deviant, was  put on display in one of the Imperial palaces.
125. 13:53Gustav Klimt would be part of the last  cultural explosion before the demise of
126. 13:58the Austro-Hungarian empire, a political entity  that was ridiculously antiquated in its day and
127. 14:04was to die in the same year that Klimt did - 1918.  Egon Schiele would die just a few months later.
128. 14:12And just like that, an intense period of  creativity and vitality drew to an end.
129. 14:19Klimt is often dismissed by critics today, as an  artist who simply produced 'decorative artifice.'
130. 14:26But his work served as an important role in bridging academic realism and the coming world of abstraction.
131. 14:33He pushed the boundaries of what Freud  called "the misunderstood and much maligned erotic."
132. 14:39And depicted the human figure as never before.
133. 14:43And then he gave us 'The Kiss', one of the most  compelling and truthful images of the 20th century.
134. 14:51We don't really know about  Klimt's thoughts on 'The Kiss',
135. 14:54but maybe we don't need to. As he once said: "If you  want to know about me - just look at my paintings"