Tag: Gustav Klimt

A toast to …

Cafe Katja.

This afternoon at Cafe Katja I’ll be raising a glass to … well, myself, for a busy week here at the blog. Apart from encouraging you to donate to radio klassik Stephansdom in Vienna, I offered a few notes from Kenneth Clark on civilization and opera, spent a few minutes looking at the triumph of wisdom, and pointed your attention towards a new Klimt exhibition opening next week at the Neue Galerie here in New York.

But I’ll also be raising a glass to Seiji Ozawa, who today stepped down from this earthly podium at the age of 88. Gramophone has a gossip-free overview of Ozawa’s career here, and the Vienna Philharmonic, of which Ozawa was an honorary member, remembers him here.

Klimt’s landscapes at the Neue Galerie

Gustav Klimt, Park at Kammer Castle, 1909, oil on canvas. Neue Galerie New York. This work is part of the collection of Estée Lauder and was made available through the generosity of Estée Lauder.

Opening next week and running through May 6 at New York’s Neue Galerie, Klimt Landscapes examines his nature paintings, a part of his work that has too often taken a back seat to his more well-known paintings and drawings of the human figure. “For the last twenty years of his career,” the Neue Galerie says, “Klimt devoted considerable energy to painting landscapes during his summer vacations on the Attersee in the Salzkammergut region of Austria, known for its tranquil lakes. Created purely for his own pleasure, these bucolic scenes became among his most sought-after pictures and were highly coveted by collectors. Most were made in a square format — a reflection of his fascination with photography.” The exhibition will be situated within a selection of the Neue Galerie’s significant Klimt holdings.

Like the landscapes of Egon Schiele, Klimt’s landscapes are revealing of a rarely seen side of a major Fin de siècle artist — as sensual as his human figures, but within a more holistic view of the physical world. More information can be found at the Neue Galerie web site here.