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A review by srash
The Lady in Gold: The Extraordinary Tale of Gustav Klimt's Masterpiece, Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer by Anne-Marie O'Connor
4.0
Pretty interesting look at a painting that I wasn't especially familiar with and its history, alongside the history of 20th century Vienna. Ends up being a family history of the subject of the painting more than anything else--Adele Bloch-Bauer, a sophisticated and wealthy Viennese Jewish society girl who likely had an affair with Gustav Klimt.
The painting ends up taking a rather winding path through Austrian history after Adele's untimely death in the 1920s. As Adele's family flees Austria after the Anschluss, the Nazis also usurp the painting and attempt to obscure its origins. After the war, Adele's surviving family have very different ideas about what should happen to the portrait, which remains in an Austrian museum, and a lengthy, contentious legal battle erupts between them and Austria over who's the rightful owner as the family itself also begins to disagree.
The painting ends up taking a rather winding path through Austrian history after Adele's untimely death in the 1920s. As Adele's family flees Austria after the Anschluss, the Nazis also usurp the painting and attempt to obscure its origins. After the war, Adele's surviving family have very different ideas about what should happen to the portrait, which remains in an Austrian museum, and a lengthy, contentious legal battle erupts between them and Austria over who's the rightful owner as the family itself also begins to disagree.