Klimt'
s highly decorative, erotic female figures were influenced by an enormous range of sources: classical Greek art, Byzantine mosaics, late-medieval painting, the woodcuts of Albrecht Durer, photography and the Symbolist art of Max Klinger. As a co-founder of the Vienna Secession, a group of artists and architects who formed their own exhibition society and denounced the classical academic training of the time, his work embodied the high-keyed erotic, psychological and aesthetic preoccupations of fin-de-siècle Viennese intellectuals.
Klimt was born in Baumgarten, a suburb of Vienna. His interest in art was nurtured by his father, an engraver. His formal training began at the Kunst-gewerbeschule in Vienna, and later he worked as an artist-decorator in association with his brother. The primal forces of sexuality, regeneration, love and death form the dominant themes of Klimt'
s work. In The Kiss, Klimt'
s best known work, beautifully rendered figures float dreamlike in space, wrapped in an abstracted mosaic robe that veils graceful contours. The rhythmic flowing line and organic forms of Klimt'
s unparalleled paintings became powerful influences on the Art Nouveau movement.
