Malcesine on Lake Garda

Malcesine on Lake Garda

Gustav Klimt is lesser known for his landscape paintings, but these are still a highly significant element of his career. Malcesine on Lake Garda is one of his most famous and the unique combination of his bold, bright artistic style with the stunning scenes from where he would work, produced some stunning artworks.

Artist Klimt had a close bond with fellow painter Egon Schiele and the latter loved to travel abroad in order to develop his work. Such influence led Gustav to take in the Italian lakes in his landscape series, an area of the country famed for it's beauty.

Typical of Klimt landscapes, Malcesine on Lake Garda is a busy artwork, uplifting and blending man and nature together in harmony. The colour and form is truly contemporary, combining elements of Cubism and Impressionism.

Many have argued for the influence of Cubist painters like Picasso, Gris and Braques on Klimt at around this time, but in reality it was really more Schiele who implemented some of their developments into his landscape scenes. This particular painting is more of a one-off in his career, rather than the start of an extended new direction.

Whilst there was always a preference for working in the Attersee spa in the Austrian Alps, Klimt used this alternative environment to experiment with his own use of light, form and colour.