EXCELLENT observation on the elongation. That also serves to separate you emotionally. I can’t get over the emotional reaction to the faces versus the aesthetic reaction to the design. I’m jerked apart, not flowing together. These really aren’t sexy women. Even the one with her rump showing prominently, though her expression is sexier than most. Your first comments about them being rich comes back to mind. That’s part of their separation from us. Those distant expressions. Looking at the academy painters, their lack of connection to us is from their mostly being the same patterned face. Here, we know this is a great portrait painter, so when they don’t connect emotionally, it’s Klimt who is forcing them apart from us.
Fun! Oh, how I miss the old art history classes.
Yes, the lack of emotional connection... many of these women are distant, maybe symbolic rather than all too human. There is also the picture with the huge ape (King Kong?) looking at the stylized women. There is almost a befuddled look in his eyes. But Kong fell for natural beauty (fell literally too from atop the Empire State). The rise of the rich women to be enshrined as some cold transcendental doesn’t comport with our animal being and maybe that is what Klimt is saying.
It’s interesting that the eye dominates — it could have been the other way where the focus is on the music with some attendant pictures. Maybe we are so use to hearing music in the supporting role as a soundtrack and not in its own right.
Yes, art class. I had taken a course on aesthetics back in the 70s and it’s now like ancient history to me. But I do like seeing this kind of stuff, to see what thoughts rear up and present themselves. It is fun!