Documents 

Si l'on connaît bien l'imaginaire fabuleux de Gustav Klimt et ses portraits de femmes fatales ou mythiques, on sait moins que l'artiste s'illustra également dans la mode. Avec sa compagne Emilie Flöge, qui dirigeait l'un des salons de couture les plus en vue de Vienne, il créa des robes réforme , participant ainsi au mouvement révolutionnaire qui bousculait alors la Vienne artistique et bourgeoise. En photographiant ces modèles pour une revue, Gustav Klimt devint le premier photographe de l'histoire de la mode.

This lavish book invites the reader to step into late 19th-century Vienna, with its intricately detailed social life and sumptuous luxury, not unlike the work of the artist who is the book's focus. The author, who knew Klimt in his last years and is a noted Klimt scholar, has brought together the paintings and the drawings from which they emerged in a way that enriches our knowledge of the artist and enhances the visual impact of his work. Using original sources, newly uncovered material, and a wealth of personal photographs, Nebehay provides a look into the major influence of Klimt upon his fellow artists and upon his society: his role as the first president of the Vienna Secession; his place in the lives of his students, among them Egon Schiele and Oskar Kokoschka; and his interaction with all the major figures of this most dangerously intoxicating and exhilarating time. The book conveys the passions that were the subject of Klimt's work and his life.