The ''Stoclet Frieze'' is a series of three mosaics created by the Austrian painter Gustav Klimt for a 1905-1911 commission for the Stoclet Palace in

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

, Belgium. The panels depict swirling ''

Tree of life The tree of life is a fundamental archetype in many of the world's mythological, religious, and philosophical traditions. It is closely related to the concept of the sacred tree.Giovino, Mariana (2007). ''The Assyrian Sacred Tree: A Hist ...

'', a standing female figure and an embracing couple.

Commission and display

The mosaics form a part of a larger commission by the Belgian financier

Adolphe Stoclet Adolphe Stoclet (1871-1949) was a Belgian engineer, financier and noted collector. Today, however, he is most famous as the man who commissioned the Stoclet Palace, a mansion in Brussels, Belgium, between 1907 and 1911. Life Stoclet was born into ...

and his wife Suzanne. The Stoclets hired the architect

Josef Hoffmann Josef Hoffmann (15 December 1870 – 7 May 1956) was an Austrian- Moravian architect and designer. He was among the founders of Vienna Secession and co-establisher of the Wiener Werkstätte. His most famous architectural work is the Stoclet Pa ...

and the

Wiener Werkstätte The Wiener Werkstätte (engl.: ''Vienna Workshop''), established in 1903 by the graphic designer and painter Koloman Moser, the architect Josef Hoffmann and the patron Fritz Waerndorfer, was a productive association in Vienna, Austria that b ...

artistic collective (‘Viennese Workshop’) to design, decorate and furnish a spacious mansion with

formal gardens Garden design is the art and process of designing and creating plans for layout and planting of gardens and landscapes. Garden design may be done by the garden owner themselves, or by professionals of varying levels of experience and expertise. ...

. The pair were avid art collectors with wide-ranging and eclectic tastes: their collection included work from many periods and cultures, from the

Far East The ''Far East'' was a European term to refer to the geographical regions that includes East and Southeast Asia as well as the Russian Far East to a lesser extent. South Asia is sometimes also included for economic and cultural reasons. The ter ...

to the

New World The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. ...

and included Egyptian sculpture, Chinese ceramics and jades, Byzantine

icon An icon () is a religious work of art, most commonly a painting, in the cultures of the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Catholic churches. They are not simply artworks; "an icon is a sacred image used in religious devotion". The most ...

s and jewelry, miniatures from Persia and Armenia, as well as numerous Western medieval paintings.Warlick 1992, 119. The diverse tastes of his patrons corresponded well with Gustav Klimt's own. Art historian M.E. Warlick notes that he "must have been delighted to find that their eclectic collection so matched many of his own recent interests". The panels were commissioned and placed along three walls of the Stoclet Palace's dining room, with the two larger, figural sections set across from each other along the longer walls of the room. A smaller geometric panel occupies the short wall separating them. The designs are decorated with a variety of luxury materials, including marble, ceramic, gilded tiles and enamel along with pearls and other semi-precious stones. When an official party of Belgian architects visited the Stoclet Palace for the very first time, on 22 September 1912, the excitement amongst it members was great. Everything from the Palace's ground plan to its silver spoons had been designed and executed by Hoffmann and the artists and craftsmen of the Wiener Werkstätte. Amidst the historicist façades lining the elegant Avenue de Tervueren/Tervurenlaan, the entire ensemble of house, garden and interior – culminating in the dining room with the celebrated ''Tree of Life'' frieze by Klimt– struck the Belgian architects as belonging to another world. "I think I'm on the planet Mars!" exclaimed one of the architects in disbelief during his visit.

Gallery

The three mosaics were originally displayed on three separate walls, with the ''Knight'' mosaic positioned centrally and the larger mosaics, each centering on a ''Tree of Life'' motif, positioned on walls to the left and right. File:Gustav Klimt 030.jpg, ''The Expectation'' File:Gustav Klimt 029.jpg, ''Knight'' File:Gustav Klimt 031.jpg, ''The Embrace'' Stoclet Frieze left

References

Bibliography

*Freytag, Annette. "Josef Hoffmann's Unknown Masterpiece: The Garden of Stoclet House in Brussels (1905–1911)," ''Studies in the History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes'', Vol. 30, No. 4, pp. 337–372. *Warlick, M.E. "Mythic Rebirth in Gustav Klimt's Stoclet Frieze: New Considerations of Its Egyptianizing Form and Content," ''The Art Bulletin'', Vol. 74, No. 1 (March 1992), pp. 115–134.

External links

Klimt Museum appreciation page
gallery of close-up images Mosaics Paintings by Gustav Klimt Wiener Werkstätte {{decorative-art-stub

Commission and display

Gallery

See also

References

Bibliography

External links