Klimt Ruling Raises Issues of Art Ownership, National Identity

Bloomberg

By Martin Gayford

Jan. 30 (Bloomberg) -- Austria may pay more than $100 million for two portraits by Gustav Klimt. Even in today's market, that isn't cheap and raises questions about the value of art and its relationship to national identity.

These aren't just any pictures. One of them, in particular, ``Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I'' (1907) has been described as the Austrian Mona Lisa and has, over the years, been reproduced on countless postcards and mousemats.

As a work of art, it is familiar but also quite odd. It's a representation of the unhappily married wife of an unattractive sugar magnate, in a manner loaded with Celtic and Byzantine symbolism and psychosexual imagery. Many Austrians consider the picture crucial to their national identity.

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