Gustav Klimt (1862-1918), an Austrian Symbolist painter, was one of the important artists founding ‘Secession Art’ and was also active during the period of Art Nouveau. In spite of his crucial role, his paintings often gave rise to various kinds of controversies and talking points. Thus, his paintings now have an important position in Western art. His reputation indeed combines both praise and notoriety at the same time. However, his works have had a lasting and profound influence. In this thesis, the author focuses on this painter and his landscape paintings as a research subject and makes an in-depth research to not only his paintings but also his innovative and creative and expressive techniques. It is hoped that, through such an exploration, Klimt’s good reputation can be restored in some way. Meantime, the author’s oil paintings can be better appreciated after Klimt’s creative thinking and painting techniques are realized.
Klimt’s landscape paintings are very unique. The reasons are: giving up a traditional landscape paintings’ arrangement of one-third horizontal form of composition and a spatial approach for treatment of near ground, middle ground and distant ground; making paintings in square shapes; broken strokes and colours in a decorative nature; rising levels of horizontal lines in compositions; and using a spatial treatment of the near-distance view to narrow relation between far and near distances down to zero and then create a sense of tranquility of
condensed space. Klimt’s landscape paintings with elaborate design look like hanging tapestries or interior paintings. They can suddenly give a sense of distance to viewers and even seem as if scenes of nature are locked inside the frames. For these reasons, fleeting nature can be immediately transformed into an eternal heaven.
The author in her oil paintings also tries to adopt Klimt’s mode. She would like to focus on Penghu where she was born and grew up and represent it in a special angle and composition approach different from other people in order to express her personal affection towards her hometown and enhance her techniques which help her creativity and expression and create some novelty.
The thesis has six chapters, titled as follows.
Chapter One Introduction
Chapter Two Klimt’s life and painting styles
Chapter Three Analyses of Klimt’s Landscape Paintings
Chapter Four Analyses of Authors’ Paintings in Paintings
Chapter Five Explanation of and Look at Authors’ Paintings
Chapter Six Conclusion
