Historicist period

Gustav Klimt was born in 1862 in Baumgarten, near Vienna. He was the second of seven children. Since childhood, he was immersed in the art world, as his father Ernst was a gold engraver, and his mother Anna was an opera singer.

At the age of 14, he enrolled at the School of Applied Arts in Vienna, where he was educated as an interior painter and decorator. This in turn, determined his first steps as an artist in the Historicist style.

During the 1880s, he began receiving government commissions to decorate the buildings on the Ringstraße. In 1883, he founded the Company of Artists together with his brother Ernst and his friend Franz Matsch. From this time period, the frescoes of the Vienna History Museum stand out, in which he represented historical scenes from Ancient Egypt up to the Modern Age, using artistic language that he had developed during his education.

In this commission, the influence of the French Symbolists on Klimt’s education can already be seen. It was at this stage when his unique iconography began to take shape, influenced by subjective and seemingly irrational aspects that are closely linked and inspired by the theories of Freud’s interpretation of dreams.