Gustav Klimt\'s ornate art expresses the apocalyptic atmosphere of Vienna\'s upper middle-class society around the turn of the 20th century - a society devoted to the cultivation of aesthetic awareness and the cult of pleasure.
His drawings in particular, which have been widely admired for their artistic excellence, are dominated by the sensual portrayal of women..
Klimt\'s fame, however, rests on his reputation as one of the greatest erotic painters and graphic artists of his times.
And death therefore plays an important role in Klimt\'s art.
The ecstatic joy which Klimt (1862-1918) and his contemporaries found - or hoped to find - in beauty was constantly overshadowed by death.
Gustav Klimt\'s ornate art expresses the apocalyptic atmosphere of Vienna\'s upper middle-class society around the turn of the 20th century - a society devoted to the cultivation of aesthetic awareness and the cult of pleasure
