Houses at Unterach on the Attersee 1916

Gustav Klimt painted "Houses at Unterach on the Attersee" with oil on canvas. It is a masterclass in the art of seeing, or rather, feeling with your eyes. Look at how the paint sits on the surface, a mosaic of brushstrokes, each a little world of color. It’s not about copying what’s there, but about building a world, brick by brick, with every dab and stroke. See that bright red house at the front? The windows are like eyes, staring back at us, almost cartoonish. It feels solid, yes, but also like it might just lift off the ground and float away. Klimt’s painting makes me think of another master of seeing, Cezanne, with his own way of breaking down the world and putting it back together. But in Klimt, there’s a wildness, a decorative impulse, that’s all his own, making this painting an ongoing conversation between eye and hand, feeling and form.