Immersive Art- Gustav Klimt at the Port of Málaga

Wednesday February 19 was mainly cloudy with a touch of sun and a high of 17C.  We made a late morning visit to the Mercado Central de Atarazanas, the large market not far from the water.  It is a fabulous market-- almost too much choice and very good quality with reasonable prices.

Fabulous range of produce

Meats and cheeses

Strawberry season--- lots of vendors had them

Our favourite olive guy

The fish stall where we bought salmon for dinner

We took the food back to the apartment and had lunch.  We then headed out to see a temporary exhibit called El Oro de Klimt (the Gold of Klimt) located in a space next to the Pompidou Museum.  Our friends had recommended the immersive art show and as it was a cloudy day, it seemed like an interesting exhibit to attend.  We are also big Klimt fans-- we visit many of his paintings at the Neue Galerie in NYC every year.

Outside of the Pompidou- a sign with 36 museums in Malaga-- city of Museums-- we're slowly working our way through many on the list

Signage near the Pompidou cube

The first room in the exhibit had posters of some of Klimt's major works with write ups in Spanish and English about his life and the individual paintings.  He was born in 1862 in Baumgarten, Austria, the second of seven siblings.  He attended the School of Art and Crafts in Vienna and was joined by one of his brothers.  Around 1897, the artistic movement known as the Vienna Succession was born, with Klimt at its head as its first chairman.  After about eight years of work the Succession split into two groups.  Klimt later joined the Viennese Workshops (Wiener Werkstätte), a group of artists, craftsmen and designers that was created in 1903.  Klimt died of a sudden heart attack in 1918.

Emilie Flöge (1874-1952) (below) was Klimt's lover and muse and a recognised Austrian fashion designer.  They met in the 1890s.  She withstood all his infidelity as he had 14 children with many other women, although he only acknowledged three of them.

Portrait of Emilie Flöge (1902-03).  

The Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I (1903-1907), also known as The Lady in Gold, is the most famous portrait that Klimt ever created and is considered the essential piece in his golden phase.  She was 26 when Klimt painted her portrait.  The original hangs today in the Neue Galerie in New York.

[The portrait was commissioned by the sitter's husband, Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer, a Jewish banker and sugar producer.  The painting was stolen by the Nazi's in 1941.  In 2006, following eight years of effort by the Bloch-Bauer heirs, the painting was returned to the family. It was sold the same year for $135 million, at the time a record price for a painting. I have added this bit of history-- the exhibit did not go into any detail about the history of the painting]

Portrait of Mäda Primavesi (1913).  She was 9 years old at the time the portrait was done-- she died in May 2000, the last person who saw Klimt paint.

We then went into a small ante room with some colourful images that one could take a selfie against.

Our selfie

Next we entered a very large room with giant screens.  There were bean bags to sit or lie in and watch the immersive show.   There were thousands of moving images projected on giant screens and other surfaces of the room, musical pieces and aromatic essences created exclusively for the audiovisual show.  Often the images would appear as brush strokes.



The 30 minutes show was in six parts, beginning in neoclassical Vienna, followed by original posters from the Vienna Secession art movement.  There was a section on Klimt's "golden" phase- with gold leaf and decorative motifs of The Kiss and other works digitally cast around the venue and set in motion to a Viennese waltz.  Then the gold is replaced by Klimt's portraits of women.  The immersive experience is supposed to draw in younger crowds, which it has done in the cities this exhibition has appeared in (Madrid, Seville, Paris).  We did not see the show in order---wandered in half way through and stayed until we got to the point where we had started.

Multiple screens with images from Klimt's paintings

Forest scenes

Country house

Beauties

From The Kiss 

More Klimt designs and colour

The show had flowers and butterflies and other objects from his works floating in front of the pictures

His Viennese Succession pieces

Klimt's monkey

Alano in the foreground on a bean bag

From the Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer (1907)

I took a rather strange panorama of the changing screens and people in the middle watching

The light show reflects on the floor as well

One of my favourites

The colours in Klimt's works are so vibrant

In an area outside the immersive piece, there were digital displays of his most important works with information about each.   I just picked two images (below) which I liked.

Portrait of Barbara Flöge, 1925 (his lover, Emilie Flöge's mother)

Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer (1914-16).  Klimt took two years to finish this painting.

[Added information:  Elisabeth was the only daughter of his greatest patrons, August and Szerena Lederer, the second wealthiest family in Vienna, behind only the Rothchilds.  Her father died in 1936 and in 1939, the Nazi's looted the Lederer art collection and family members were forced into exile.  Elisabeth remained in Vienna; she had converted to Protestantism when she married in 1921.  She became Jewish again after the couple divorced in 1934.  Her only child had died.  Facing persecution, Elisabeth circulated that story that Klimt was her real father.  Her mother signed an affidavit attesting to Klimt's paternity in order to save her daughter.  The scheme worked and the Nazi regime provided her with a document stating that she was descended from Klimt.  She lived unharmed in Vienna until her premature death in 1944.] 

It was definitely an interesting experience.  The company had done a similar show with the work of Van Gogh a few years ago.  I think Klimt was an excellent choice as there is so much colour and the individual pieces and background elements are well-suited for such an immersive and interactive exhibit.

After our visit to the Immersive Art exhibit we walked along the water beside the park.

Very nice walk

View back to the lighthouse and area where we had walked the other day

Palm trees are one of my favourite trees and there are lots in Málaga

Close up of the lighthouse and craft stalls

View of the lovely buildings on the city side of the park

The "Cenachero", a popular character in Málaga, a fish seller who balances two wicker backers called cenachos.
Sculpture by Málaga artist, Jamie Fernández Pimentel in 1968.

We wandered into the Soho area and decided to have a drink/coffee at the outdoor patio of the Contemporary Art Centre (CAC), which we had visited earlier in our stay.

Lots of graffiti 

Techno graffiti

Poster of the neighbourhood graffiti in the CAC, listing the artists

The real graffiti just a block away from the CAC

I had a glass of beer and Alano had a café con leche

We headed back to the apartment and Alano prepared some chorizo, sheep cheese and olive appetizers.

Delicious chorizo and cheese

Alano then made salmon (very fresh), zucchini and tomatoes as a main course.  We had a new bottle of wine from Ronda in Málaga province.  We had read that there are some very good wines in the area, and the woman in the wine shop recommended the bottle we are drinking.  A very good wine and a lovely dinner.

Alano with salmon, veg and wine