By Gustav Klimt
Located in Chicago, IL
Original collotype created from Gustav Klimt’s Approaching Thunderstorm (The Large Poplar II), painted in 1903. Published and edited by Verlag H.O. Miethke and printed by k.k. Hof- und Staatsdruckerei, Vienna, in an edition of 300.
Between 1908 and 1914, H.O. Miethke published Das Werk Gustav Klimts, a folio of collotypes representing Gustav Klimt’s most notable works leading up to 1913. Klimt’s original oil paintings were painstakingly reproduced as collotypes on a handmade, deckled-edge cream wove paper using a complex gravure process overseen by master technicians as well as the artist himself. Each image presented in the folio was assigned its own unique signet, which was designed by Klimt and struck below the image using a technique similar to letterpress. The signet corresponded to a matching signet in the justification page which detailed the piece’s size, location, and owner.
Published under the artist’s direct supervision, this series allowed Klimt, who had completely divorced himself from public commissions following the outcry from his University of Vienna paintings, to more effectively present his artworks to institutions and patrons across the world. A testament to the masterful design and printmaking demonstrated by Das Werk Gustav Klimts, Emperor Franz Joseph himself purchased the first copy of the folio.
Klimt’s The Swamp...
Category
Early 1900s Vienna Secession Prints and Multiples