Shop art print and framed art Portrait of Ria Munk III by Gustav Klimt

The portrait of Ria Munk III is the last of three commemorative portraits of Maria Munk, known as "Ria", painted by the Viennese artist Gustav Klimt. The third portrait of Ria Munk, entitled Frauenbildnis (Ria Munk III), was begun in late 1917 but never completed by the artist. It is one of the largest full-length female portraits in Klimt's late style. In the foreground is a standing young woman whose face in profile seems to be observing the viewers with large dark eyes topped by thick black eyebrows on a round face with rosy, rounded cheeks and a dreamy smile. The figure is wearing a dressing gown, barely outlined in charcoal, with a lace collar around the neck. The girl appears at ease, confident and candid, with no hint of the eroticism typical of Klimt's work. "As in the case of many other portraits of Viennese high society personalities, the artist immerses the subject in an elaborate background charged with symbolic elements. Ria is surrounded by a multitude of flowers with precise meanings: roses, tulips, peonies, chrysanthemums, carnations and cineraria, taken from Chinese symbolism, indicate happiness, wealth, beauty and nobility; while a delicate bouquet of white and blue hyacinths, which the young woman wears over her face, is associated with the afterlife and at the same time indicates love and romance in Western culture. The presence of a yellow curtain, decorated with a calabash and its flowers, Chinese and Japanese ideograms that are auspicious symbols for a [...]

 

This artwork is a painting from the modern period. It belongs to the symbolism style.

 

« Portrait of Ria Munk III » is kept at Private Collection.

 

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