The Kiss

Artist
Gustav Klimt
Year
1907–1908
Medium
Oil and gold leaf on canvas
Dimensions
180 cm × 180 cm
Source
View Original

Klimt’s gilded masterpiece, painted during his ‘Golden Phase’, shows a couple locked in an embrace at the edge of a flower meadow, their robes dissolving into shimmering ornament. Exhibited unfinished at the 1908 Kunstschau in Vienna, it was purchased by the Austrian state before completion — a scandal at the time — and now anchors the Belvedere museum’s collection.