Gustav Klimt – The Virgin

The Virgin is Klimt’s painting of 1913: a young woman asleep with her arms raised above her head, surrounded by a tangle of girls who are waking up, all wrapped in a swirl of violet, blue and pink fabrics. The original, oil on canvas, belongs to the National Gallery Prague. We paint it by hand in oil on canvas, in eight sizes or to your own measurement, and send you a photograph of the finished work for approval before dispatch.

The Virgin – Gustav Klimt

What does the painting show?

We look down from above, as if standing over a bed. In the middle a young woman is asleep, her arms raised above her head, her face relaxed, her eyes closed. Around her other girls are entwined: some still sleep, others stretch or open their eyes. Heads, arms and legs overlap so much that it is hard to say where one figure ends and the next begins.

They all lie on a swirl of fabrics covered with patterns, spirals and flowers in violet, blue, pink and white, curling across the canvas like a large oval. The background is dark, almost black-green, so the colours and the pale skin glow all the more. There is no gold here: this is Klimt in his late, colourful period.

Who is the virgin, and what is happening around her?

The virgin is the sleeping girl in the middle. The National Gallery Prague describes the painting as a sleeping virgin in a relaxed pose, surrounded by a tangle of female bodies in various stages of awakening. No model is named, and it does not matter: the figure stands for youth and femininity, not for one particular person.

Many viewers read the painting as a dream. The girls around the sleeper are like figures from her dreams, or like stages a young woman passes through. Klimt does not tell a story with a beginning and an end here; he creates a state between sleep and waking that the viewer completes for themselves.

What does the painting mean?

The Prague gallery stresses the theme of femininity: the relationship between beauty and transience, between youth and death, with an erotic undertone created by the dreamlike scene of sleeping and waking women. The subject was common in the art of the Vienna Secession, but here Klimt painted it with more colour than ever before.

The spirals and flowers on the fabrics are more than decoration. The cloth wraps the girls like a cradle or a cocoon from which they slowly wake. That is why the painting feels calm and warm even though it speaks of transience, and why people like to hang it in a room meant for rest.

How did The Virgin come to Prague?

Klimt painted The Virgin in 1913. Only a year later, in 1914, it was shown in Prague at an exhibition of eleven of his works, and the Prague gallery bought it there. It has stayed in Prague ever since and is one of the best-known works in the collections of the National Gallery.

It belongs to Klimt’s late period, when he had almost given up gold and replaced it with strong colours and lively patterns. It measures 200 cm high and 190 cm wide, so it is almost square, which is why our sizes are almost square as well.

The Virgin among Klimt’s works

Klimt kept returning to women and the stages of their lives. In 1905 he painted The Three Ages of Woman, where a child, a mother and an old woman stand side by side. On the right half of Death and Life there is a similar tangle of sleeping bodies in colourful blankets, only there Death stands beside them.

From Klimt’s later years we also paint Lady with a Feather Hat, and for a comparison with the Golden Period, The Kiss. Choose The Virgin if you want Klimt without gold, in strong, warm colours.

How is our hand-painted version made?

The painter first draws the oval of fabrics and every face and arm in thin lines, because with bodies so closely entwined each figure has to sit exactly in its place. Then he paints the skin, softly and in several layers, and only after that the fabrics, the dark ground and finally hundreds of spirals, rings and flowers.

The photographs at the top of the page show two copies we have painted. The first photograph shows a copy in a gold-coloured frame with a light inner liner on an easel in our studio, and the second and third show it from both sides. The fourth photograph is a close-up of a sleeping face with closed eyes, red lips and flowers in the hair, beside it a dark-blue cloth with pink circles; the canvas weave is visible too. The fifth photograph shows a second copy, still unframed on its stretcher, on an easel in our framing workshop; the sixth and seventh show it from the side among the frame mouldings. The eighth photograph is a close-up of another sleeping face and a green-and-red striped cloth, where the thick brushstrokes are easy to see.

Every painting is a hand-painted copy made for your order, so no two are ever quite the same, as our two copies show. A printed oil painting reproduction cannot show the relief of the brushstrokes and the depth of colour that you can see and feel on the canvas.

Which size for which wall?

Short answer: 100 x 105 cm for most walls, 120 x 130 or 150 x 160 cm above a double bed or a large sofa, and 70 x 75 or 80 x 85 cm for a smaller wall. There are eight sizes: 70 x 75, 80 x 85, 90 x 95, 100 x 105, 120 x 130, 150 x 160, 170 x 180 and 190 x 200 cm.

All of them are almost square, a little taller than wide, like the original, and 190 x 200 cm is the size of the original itself. Because it shows sleeping girls, it suits a bedroom, above the bed. It also works well in a living room with warm light. A painting for the living room should take up about two thirds of the width of the furniture below it.

Hang it with the centre of the canvas about 150 cm above the floor, and 20 to 30 cm above a bed, a chest of drawers or a sofa.

Custom size, stretcher and frame

If you need a different size, for example a perfect square or one for a particular wall, we paint it to measure. Send us the width and height you want and we will quote a price and a lead time. Every painting we make is stretched over a wooden stretcher and ready to hang.

For the moulding, use our 3D application: it shows every one of our frame profiles on this subject, so you can compare gold, silver, black, white and natural wood before deciding – the application is for choosing the frame only. If you would like to see how the painting will look on your own wall, that is our separate room placement service. A gold-coloured frame with a light liner, like the one in the photographs above, brings out the colours, but the painting also looks good unframed.

Delivery and guarantee

Every painting is made to order in our studio in Slovenia, so allow 15 to 45 days depending on the size you choose. We ship it stretched and protected for transport, framed if you chose a frame, across the EU with no customs. Before dispatch you receive a photograph of the finished work to approve, and our returns policy applies to every order.

Every other Klimt work we paint is in the Gustav Klimt gallery, and there is more about the painter in our ten facts about Klimt. If the painting is a gift and you are unsure of the size, there is a wall art voucher: the recipient chooses the size and the subject.

Frequently asked questions

Where is The Virgin by Klimt today?

Klimt’s The Virgin is in the National Gallery Prague (Národní galerie Praha). The gallery bought it in 1914, a year after it was painted, at a Prague exhibition where eleven of Klimt’s works were shown. It has been in Prague ever since and is one of the best-known works in its collections. If you visit Prague, you can see it in person.

What does The Virgin by Klimt mean?

The Virgin is about femininity. A sleeping girl in the middle is surrounded by a tangle of girls who are waking up, and the Prague gallery sees in it the relationship between beauty and transience, youth and death, with the erotic undertone of a dream. Many read it as the dream of the sleeping virgin. More about the painting on Wikipedia.

How many women are in The Virgin?

The number of women in The Virgin is hard to pin down, and that is the point. Heads, arms and legs overlap, and the bodies melt into a swirl of fabric. The gallery describes a sleeping girl surrounded by a tangle of female bodies in various stages of awakening. Look closely and you keep finding new faces, some asleep, some half awake.

When was The Virgin painted?

The Virgin was painted in 1913. That is Klimt’s late period, when he had almost given up gold and painted with strong colours and lively patterns. The very next year, in 1914, it was shown at an exhibition in Prague, where the gallery bought it. Klimt died five years later, in 1918.

Who is the sleeping girl in The Virgin?

The sleeping girl in The Virgin is not a portrait of a known person. The Prague gallery speaks of a virgin in a relaxed pose, and no model is named. The figure stands for youth and femininity rather than for one woman. That is why so many people recognise something in it, and why it works as a gift: it is not someone else’s portrait.

Is there gold in The Virgin?

No, there is no gold in The Virgin. It was painted in 1913, when Klimt had almost entirely replaced gold with strong colours: violet, blue, pink and white on a dark ground. So there is none on our painting either. If you want Klimt with gold, The Kiss is the choice; The Virgin is for people who love colour.

In which sizes can I order The Virgin?

You can order The Virgin in eight sizes, from 70 x 75 to 190 x 200 cm, all almost square like the original. The 190 x 200 cm size is the size of the original itself. If you want a perfect square or a size for a particular wall, we paint it to measure and quote the price and the lead time in advance.

Which room suits The Virgin?

The Virgin shows best in a bedroom, above the bed, since it shows girls asleep in soft fabrics. As a canvas painting it also works well in a living room with warm light, where the violets and blues come into their own. Because of its dark background it likes a light wall, which makes the colours stand out even more.

Is The Virgin a good gift?

Yes, The Virgin makes a lovely gift, for example for a new home or for someone who loves Klimt but only knows his gold. The colours are warm and cheerful and the subject is calm. Because we paint every painting individually, we can match the size to the recipient’s wall, and you receive a photograph of the finished work before dispatch.

• Subject: a young woman asleep in a swirl of colourful fabrics, surrounded by girls who are waking up.
• Original: 1913, 200 x 190 cm, National Gallery Prague.
• Ours: a Klimt reproduction painted by hand in oil on canvas, in eight sizes or made to measure.
• Worth knowing: you receive a photograph of the finished work for approval before dispatch.