This documentary explores the frank eroticism and hidden meanings behind symbolist painter Gustav Klimt’s “The Kiss,” as well as the scandalous life of the artist himself. Klimt was a leading figure in the Art Nouveau and Vienna Secession movements. His opulent paintings and objets d'art combined radical modernism, ancient mythology, and sensitive sensuality, with the female form serving as their main theme. In the early 1890s, Gustav Klimt, who fathered at least fourteen children, met Austrian fashion designer Emilie Louise Flöge, a sibling of his sister-in-law. “The Kiss” (1907–08) is believed to depict them as lovers. It now hangs in the Österreichische Galerie Belvedere museum in Vienna and is widely considered Klimt's masterwork.
