The Three Ages of Woman Gustav Klimt (1862-1918)

Description of Gustav Klimt’s painting Girls

The painting "Girls" by the famous Austrian artist of the early 20th century is better known to the narrow circle of extravagant art connoisseurs as "The Three Ages of Woman." The artist depicts three periods in the life of each woman in a manner peculiar to him alone, not at all shying away from depicting naked bodies and even saturating the picture with phallic symbols.

On the right side of the picture is a baby girl, with her mother, a young girl in the prime of her life, embracing her. The characters are naked, but their nudity is so beautiful and enchanting that it evokes nothing but admiration.

On the left side of the canvas we can see an old woman who is also nude but far from beautiful. She covers her face with her hand and understands that her nudity is not beautiful at all. Her body has sunken in, her belly and breasts are sagging, and nothing reminds her of the beauty she had in her youth. The women are set against a backdrop of many small and quite large flowers, as if reclining on a carpet of flowers.

The painting refers to the last years of the artist’s life, the so-called "golden age" in the fate of the genius, the time when he goes on a trip to Venice, Ravenna and Florence and begins to write intensely. By the end of the journey he comes to the conclusion that his work is too full of detail and decides to pay more attention to the psychological side of painting. It is at this time that nude bodies appear on the canvases, drowning in flowers.

Floral paintings drove mad half of Vienna residents, every owner of the fashion salon sought to buy ready, or to order on your own choice, a picture of the eminent artist. The number of clients did not decrease until the beginning of the First World War, when the artist’s paintings lose their brightness and darken, reflecting the thoughts and feelings of the author about the war.