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Gustav Klimt - Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer 1907

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From Neue Galerie New York :
Adele Bloch-Bauer possesses the rare distinction as the only person Klimt ever painted twice. Following the outcry surrounding Klimt' s most controversial public commission -three faculty paintings that were to be installed in the Great Hall of Vienna University (Philosophy, Medicine, and Jurisprudence, 1900-07)- Klimt withdrew from government projects and focused his energies on private portrait commissions of society women from Vienna's cultural elite.
Ferdinand and Adele Bloch-Bauer assembled one of Vienna's most renowned art collections, which included paintings by masters of Vienna's Biedermeier period, modern sculpture, an impressive array of porcelain from the Royal Vienna Porcelain Factory, and a stellar group of works by Klimt, including the two portraits of Adele Bloch-Bauer and also landscapes. The Klimt paintings originally hung in Adele's private apartment in the couple's Vienna home.
Klimt's 1907 Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I was acquired for Neue Galerie New York in 2006. At the time of the acquisition, the museum's President and co-founder, Ronald S. Lauder, stated: "With this dazzling painting, Klimt created one of his greatest works of art." During the years that Klimt labored over the commission, he spent time in Ravenna, Italy, where he visited the sixth-century Church of San Vitale. He was deeply impressed by the richly decorated Byzantine mosaics of the Empress Theodora and described them as of "unprecedented splendor." His first portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer incorporates jewel-like areas that resemble semi-precious stones and layers of lustrous gold and silver.
A series of lectures will be held in conjunction with this special exhibition, including presentations by scholar Dr. Alessandra Comini, curator of "Egon Schiele: Portraits"; Anne-Marie O'Connor, author of The Lady in Gold: The Extraordinary Tale of Gustav Klimt's Masterpiece; and Janis Staggs, curator of "Gustav Klimt and Adele Bloch-Bauer: The Woman in Gold."