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Guggenheim staff, 1968

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Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele

Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele

Contributions by Alessandra Comini, James T. Demetrion, Johannes Dobai, and Thomas M. Messer
Published in 1965
124 pages
Softcover

Excerpt

Where Klimt is ornamentally decorous, Schiele is often indecorously expressive. Klimt's meticulously structured mosaic compositions are opposite in concept and execution from Schiele's sure and daring linear scheme, as are Klimt's subtly balanced tonal effects when seen in juxtaposition with Schiele's fauve and eventually expressionist use of color. Klimt strives through formal means to attain an order that, not unlike Mondrian's, reduces spontaneous and individual components to a collective validity. Schiele, in contrast more like Klee, transcribes highly personal insights which then assume the power of evoking common experiences. Above all, Klimt, despite his current relevance to modern art, must be seen as a late exponent of an historic style, whereas Schiele raises to the most intense pitch the newly acquired awareness of 20th century man. Together, Klimt and Schiele signify an end and a beginning, and at one poignant moment their adjoining forms point simultaneously backward and forward to comprise the past and future in a fleeting present.

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