Gustav Klimt

Gustav Klimt, watercolour and pencil, 2015, 6 x 8 inches

Gustav Klimt, detail.

Gustav Klimt (1862 - 1918) was a Austrian symbolist painter mostly famous for his highly decorative paintings using gold leaf. Initially a very successful conventional painter of portraits and murals, he developed a more controversial and erotic style of painting influenced by Japanese art. I have been a huge fan of his since my teens. I adore the decorative style and the themes of life, sex and death that run through his work, so I decided to paint his portrait for the EBSQ Portrait of an Artist exhibition.