The Lady in Gold: The Extraordinary Tale of Gustav Klimt's Masterpiece, Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer

by Anne-Marie O'Connor

The Lady in Gold, considered an unforgettable masterpiece, one of the twentieth century's most recognizable paintings, made headlines all over the world when Ronald Lauder bought it for $135 million a century after Klimt, the most famous Austrian painter of his time, completed the society portrait. Anne-Marie O'Connor, writer for the Washington Post, formerly of the Los Angeles Times, tells the galvanizing story of the Lady in Gold, Adele Bloch-Bauer, a dazzling Viennese Jewish society figure; daughter of the head of one of the largest banks in the Hapsburg Empire, head of the Oriental Railway, whose Orient Express went from Berlin to Constantinople; wife of Ferdinand Bauer, sugar-beet baron. The Bloch-Bauers were art patrons, and Adele herself was considered a rebel of fin de siècle Vienna (she wanted to be educated, a notion considered "degenerate” in a society that believed women being out in the world went against their feminine "nature"). The author describes how Adele inspired the portrait and how Klimt made more than a hundred sketches of her-simple pencil drawings on thin manila paper. And O'Connor writes of Klimt himself, son of a failed gold engraver, shunned by arts bureaucrats, called an artistic heretic in his time, a genius in ours. She writes of the Nazis confiscating the portrait of Adele from the Bloch-Bauers' grand palais; of the Austrian government putting the painting on display, stripping Adele's Jewish surname from it so that no clues to her identity (nor any hint of her Jewish origins) would be revealed. Nazi officials called the painting, "The Lady in Gold" and proudly exhibited it in Vienna's Baroque Belvedere Palace, consecrated in the 1930s as a Nazi institution. The author writes of the painting, inspired by the Byzantine mosaics Klimt had studied in Italy, with their exotic symbols and swirls, the subject an idol in a golden shrine. We see how, sixty years after it was stolen by the Nazis, the Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer became the subject of a decade-long litigation between the Austrian government and the Bloch-Bauer heirs, how and why the U.S. Supreme Court became involved in the case, and how the Court's decision had profound ramifications in the art world. In this book listeners will find riveting social history; an illuminating and haunting look at turn-of-the-century Vienna; a brilliant portrait of the evolution of a painter; a masterfully told tale of suspense. And at the heart of it, The Lady in Gold-the shimmering painting, and its equally irresistible subject, the fate of each forever intertwined.

Genres: Nonfiction, Art, History, Art History, Biography, Book Club, World War II

370 pages, ebook

First published February 7, 2012

About the author

Anne-Marie O'Connor is a veteran foreign correspondent, war reporter and culture writer who has covered everything from post-Soviet Cuba to American artists and intellectuals. O'Connor attended Vassar and the San Francisco Art Institute and graduated from the University of California at Berkeley, where she and fellow students co-created an award-winning documentary on the repression of mural artists after the 1973 military coup in Chile. She covered the wars in El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Guatemala as a Reuters bureau chief in Central America; the Shining Path guerrillas in Peru, coups in Haiti and U.S. interventions in Haiti and Panama; and covered Cuba and Haiti for a newspaper chain. At the Los Angeles Times she chronicled the violence of Mexico's Arellano-Felix drug cartel, U.S. political convention; and profiled such figures as Nelson Mandela, George Soros, Joan Didion, John McCain, and Maya Lin. Her story on Maria Altmann's effort to recover the family Klimt collection appeared in the Los Angeles Times Magazine in 2001. She has written for Esquire, The Nation, and The Christian Science Monitor. She currently writes for The Washington Post from Jerusalem.​
www.annemarieoconnor.com

Reviews

[Margo Brooks · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book, but it was a struggle to get through for three reasons. First, I blame the publisher for the title which I found misleading. Yes, the author's inspiration was the law suit to repatriate Klimt's portrait of Adel Bloch-Bouer. However, the majority of the book has nothing to do with the painting, the lawsuit or the story behind either. It does provide a fascinating picture of Vienna's art world between the wars and a horrifying description of the Nazi occupation of Austria. I wish the title had emphasized the story of the social milieu in which the painting was created and traveled rather than calling the story of the portrait itself fascinating.

Second, I did not like the writing. The author uses fictionalization scenes and peculiarly phrased sentences to paint little vignettes of people and places. I found vignette after vignette to be tiresome and I often didn't know why they were being presented in this context. Why, for example, do we care that Freud skipped a medical lecture to see Mark Twain talk in Vienna? It had nothing to do with Klimt, the painting, Adele or the law suit. It might have been ok as a way to show the overall social scene in Vienna at the time that Klimt lived, but every small 3-4 page chapter was like that.

Third, there was no narrative. The little vignettes followed roughly in chronological order, but I certainly didn't comprehend the whole story. I want details, but not the type of detail that the author gave. I would rather have details of the story itself and a concrete thesis to follow.

In conclusion, I think that the author got confused about why she was writing this book and didn't present her information in the best possible light. That said, I found some of the book interesting, it just wasn't what I had hoped to be reading about.

[Patricia · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are so many reasons to read this book.
- The Lady in Gold is a must read for anyone who loves Klimt or Belle-epoque Vienna.
- It should be required reading for any art student (or art lover).
- It carries the flame of remembrance of the Holocaust in a profoundly moving way.
- It captures the interplay between those who have felt the weight of the collective guilt of the German people
and those who would deny it or trivialize it. (It reminds me of the New German Film of the 1970s) It also raises the spectre of Austrian and Croatian complicity in important ways.
- The role the US Supreme Court plays in the story of Adele I restitution is a moment of pride for American idealism.
- Anyone interested in International law will also find this intriguing, in a light way.
-O'Connor also captures the insanity of the art auction world, and the impact on family of money, war and remembrance.

I caution you, this is not an easy book to read -- it is painful at times, and the story is convoluted, with as many players as a Tolstoi novel. The style is subtle -straightforward and understated. Yet, it is the sort of book that impacts the soul and lingers.

[Joy D · Rating 4 out of 5]

Three-part story of the family that commissioned Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer, a painting by Gustav Klimt, completed in 1907. Part I gives the background of how and why the painting was created. It presents biographical material on both Gustav Klimt and Adele Bloch-Bauer, as well as relevant history of Viennese society in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Part II focuses on Nazi looting of art and other property from Jewish families, including the Bloch-Bauers, during WWII. It follows the stories of various family members, and how they escaped (or did not). Part III tells about the legal fight by the heirs to recover their paintings from the Austrian government many decades after the war.

O’Connor writes in a journalistic style. She includes a depth of detail about art history, the secessionist movement, and the art scene in Vienna prior to WWII. She also contributes to the canon of the Holocaust narrative by recounting the horrific tragedies and heroic rescues with respect to the extended family of the Bloch-Bauers. The book is well-researched and includes a massive amount of information, some of which is only tangentially related to the main premise. It covers an extensive time period and there are many names to recall. It probably could benefit from the inclusion of a family tree to assist readers in remembering all the players.

Overall, I found it a compelling story, combining art history, the Holocaust, and legal disputes. It is a niche read, appealing those that enjoy both art and history.

[Matal “The Mischling Princess” Baker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rural America has a huge KKK problem. And to make matters worse, they’ve evolved over time. Sure, they still burn crosses and have fancy little parades in town where they get to show off their white hoods. But their methods of terrorism have aligned more closely with modern Neo-Nazi groups. And I’m not talking about just the overt methods, like publicly berating, assaulting, and murdering people. The covert methods they utilize are far more insidious and damaging: stalking people, trying to physically run drivers off of the road, twisting the arms of people—even doctors and dentists—to do their bidding for them, ruining reputations and careers, breaking into your email accounts, and etc.

And if all that wasn’t good enough for them, the KKK started making “friends” with other groups like cartels in Mexico and terrorists in the Middle East where they network. And why shouldn’t they? After all, they share many common goals. So what do you do when they decide to attack?

You can’t go to the County Sheriff for help because Ol’ Bucky’s been a dues-paying member since 1989. You can’t go to the State Police because Ol’ Bucky’s brothers, cousins, and in-laws are all State Boys. And you most certainly can’t go to police in other counties or cities because, well, Ol’ Bucky’s got “friends” there, too. If you’re Jewish, you go straight to the Jewish community and get help. But if you’re a mischling, well, you have to help yourself, because you already know that **nobody** is coming to save you. As I read Anne-Marie O’Connor’s book, “The Lady in Gold: The Extraordinary Tale of Gustav Klimt's Masterpiece, Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer,” this story became more and more personal, in more ways than one. One of O’Connor’s quotes summed up my own ancestry perfectly:

“Like many things and many people in Austria, the bunker beneath the Belvedere possessed a mysterious pedigree.”

O’Connor introduces readers to so many different lives. Adele Bloch-Bauer is, of course, the most prominent. But the author delves into the lives of nearly everyone who is connected to her. And, like the quote above, it seemed like **everyone** had a story similar to my own:

My grandmother was born in Vienna, and she was definitely Austrian, as were both her parents. But they were born in Moravia (now the Czech Republic). Her grandparents were also Czech-born Moravians, except for her grandfather, who was Jewish Hungarian. Her mother and uncle—both mischlings—were taken to the synagogue in Vienna while they were still children and were formally converted to Judaism, although they both kept practicing the state religion, Catholicism. So what was my grandmother? Both she and her mother were legally Jewish—as was my father—but she was also a mischling because her father was a gentile. But she didn’t see herself as any of these things; she was an Austrian. And then she became an American after marrying my grandfather—himself a mischling (Native Indigenous and European gentile). So what **was** she? And what does that make me?

The Nazi’s desperately tried to answer these questions, going so far as to create complex inheritance charts, misusing the field of anthropology to focus on their favorite pseudoscience: Eugenics. Passing a slew of laws and engaging in racist attacks that were designed to sever people from their sources of social support, they made the “other” into state enemies. How? Sure, they twisted people’s arms—sometimes literally—but, as O’Connor reveals in this masterpiece, they primarily relied on fear, pseudoscience, propaganda, selfishness, and the overabundance of greed and envy to carry out mass extermination.

If you ask any Jewish person, they will flat out tell you that I am **NOT** Jewish; I’m a mischling—nothing more than a descendant and not a part of The Tribe. But apparently, somebody forgot to give the KKK and Neo-Nazi’s the message. They call me a Jew and treat me just like they would treat a Jewish person. So, you see—excepting the brave Jews and gentiles I’ve met—I get all the hate and none of the love LOL.

But during WWII, things were a bit different, and I appreciate how O’Connor discusses the role of mischlings (or mischlinge in German). In Europe, being classified as a mischling could actually save your life (that is, if you weren’t already classified as an Aryan or as a higher form of ‘sub-human’). Sure, you were still in a precarious situation—nobody really liked you, they publicly humiliated you, other people dictated who you could or couldn’t marry, you couldn’t find a job, and etc.—but at least you stood a greater chance of not getting shipped off to Auschwitz; you had a chance to live. But at the same time, being a mischling meant that you had to watch all of your Jewish family members and friends die; you would be left all alone.

Being cut off socially from the rest of humanity bothers people, but after I learned that the KKK and Neo-Nazi’s operate in a manner similar to the original Nazi’s—to cut their victims off of social support networks (e.g., family, friends, colleagues, and etc.)—I, and many others before me, learned not to just live with it, but to thumb my nose at it—just like many of the subjects in O’Connor’s book did.

O’Connor did a fantastic job writing about Adele’s life, primarily focusing on her life during fin de siècle Vienna. However, she equally discussed Gustav Klimt’s life (including that of his mistresses and children), the multiple lives of Bloch-Bauer family members and all of their friends, and even Hitler himself. O’Connor told so many fascinating stories but her brilliance as a writer really shone when she proved that she was able to cohesively weave them together, culminating in the story of Adele’s niece, Maria (Bloch-Bauer) Altmann.

I remember when I was younger how I held my breath, asking my grandmother if her grandfather, Gabriel, was alive during WWII. When she answered, “No,” that he died prior to that time, I felt overcome with relief, and then felt immediately shameful afterwards. I was relieved that he didn’t have to suffer through that tyranny and got to die a “normal” death, but ashamed because unlike so many other millions of people, he had a funeral. As I read this book, I found myself feeling the same way about Adele.

This is a book that I could **not** put down. When I was two-thirds done reading this book, though, I realized that I was getting angrier and angrier. I know history and I understand what happened during that era. I know that after the war, Austrian Nazi’s and collaborators,

“…were allowed to paper over their pasts and portray themselves as unwilling participants. They felt sorry for themselves, and for the proud family names sullied with the taint of Nazi collaboration…”

So, of course, restitution for stolen art was out of the question—at least in the minds of the Nazi collaborators. Even today, there’s plenty of stories where KKK/Neo-Nazi victims get huge court-ordered payouts. But those people are the ***exception***, not the rule. The rest of us just try to keep surviving. To some people, it might seem like a made-up tale, but our burgeoning FBI files testify about what we were forced to endure. Everyone, it seems, is determined to keep it all a nasty, little secret. But this is, and has always been, nothing new as O’Connor rightly points out. One of the prime examples that she provides is that of Heinrich Gross who,

“…directed the euthanasia of children and babies who had been the subject of experiments at a notorious clinic at Steinhof hospital. Some eight hundred deemed “unfit” by the Nazis—bed wetters, slow learners, children with harelips—died or were deported. Here children had brain surgery while still conscious, or were monitored while they froze to death. Attempts to prosecute Gross had been quashed since the 1950s. Gross continued to use the brains of the euthanized children, sealed in jars of formaldehyde—a collection he called “unique in the world”—for research that won him the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art in 1975. The next year he attempted a follow-up exam on a survivor, who alerted the press. Opelt [his student] was appalled by the grisly revelations. It disturbed him that so many people kept Professor Gross’s secrets. Some of these secret-keepers had been involved in the crimes. Others simply knew but were afraid of the greater questions they raised, of their own guilt as passive witnesses…”

Everyone—both in the past and the present—whether in Germany, Austria, or even the United States, is determined to hide crimes and criminal complicity, whether they are individuals, police, federal agents, politicians, or government officials. And they won’t stop until someone **makes them** stop. In the Bloch-Bauer family’s case, that someone was Maria (Bloch-Bauer) Altmann. As Helen Mirren, who played Maria, stated in the movie based on this book, The Woman in Gold,

“…They’ll never admit to what they did, because if they admit to one thing, they have to admit to it all.”

How true this statement is! Even today, politicians and local, state, and federal authorities are busily covering up crimes committed not just in the past, but also in the present, by the KKK and Neo-Nazi criminals against fellow American citizens. By turning our suffering into nasty, little secrets, they truly believe that they will all be released from the shame of complicity. Even so, they continue to complain about **their** injustices. As if that wasn’t bad enough, those same types of people have the **audacity** to complain about Holocaust survivors:

“…Had the family left a painting in public hands, Kimmelman wrote, “they would have underscored the righteousness of their battle for restitution and in the process made clear that art, even in these money-mad days, isn’t only about the money…”

That’s certainly an easy argument for Kimmelman to make. But the Bloch-Bauer heirs lost **everything** (money, homes, livelihoods, and for some, even their own lives). Most were forced to immigrate elsewhere—to a foreign land and often with nothing but the clothes on their backs. Altmann’s fight wasn’t just “…about the money…” but justice. Unfortunately, everyone in the world—including art dealers and museums—were looking for a handout, all the while ignoring the fact that their field of expertise was also guilty not just by their ongoing refusal to make restitutions, but by actually trying to hide the evidence of their own wrongdoing.

This book is 100% brilliant and a story that desperately needed to be told. O’Connor goes out of her way to tell a number of different personal stories from a variety of equally differing viewpoints. She includes both endnotes and a bibliography that, while not being as hardcore as an academic book, does provide enough evidence to backup her statements to satisfy the general public.

If you have seen the film already, I encourage you to read this book as well because the book is SO much more detailed. After reading this book, you will see some noticeable differences in the film. Usually, this would bother me excessively, but given the interwoven stories throughout the book, I would venture to guess that the screenwriter(s) found it to be a nearly impossible task to reproduce. I cannot recommend this book enough!

[Stacey B · Rating 4 out of 5]

This painting is fabulous.
I happened to have seen Klimt's painting way before I read the book, though I wish it were reversed.
It is such a shame I wasn't aware of the many sides to Klimt, nor did I know the "entire" back story to appreciate and truly understand this piece of art in total. Our docent must have been short on time.
There is much to be learned through this book about the persona of two different people.
Adele Bloch passed away at an early age, I believe from meningitis.
If she were alive, what would be different?
Oh ,and yes.. The movie cast was superb.
Helen Mirren was excellent- as always.

[Book Concierge · Rating 4 out of 5]

Subtitled: The Extraordinary Tale of Gustav Klimt’s Masterpiece, Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer

This is a story of a portrait of a beautiful Viennese Jewish salon hostess, the now-vanished turn-of-the-century Vienna cultural scene of which it became an emblem, the atrocities of the Nazi regime, and the efforts of Adele’s heirs to recover this and other paintings from an Austrian government that wished to hide the realities of war-time complicity.

My husband and I have reproductions of two Klimt paintings in our home – The Kiss (perhaps his most famous work) and Water Serpents I, so I was immediately interested in the book. I really appreciated that O’Connor took the reader back to the late 19th century and early 20th century to paint the landscape of the era – the parties, the intrigue, the art scene, the romantic scandals, the loving families and not-so-loving marriages. I was completely drawn into this era and felt the loss of it when the narrative moved on to the war years and how the family members endured and/or escaped.

I thought it lost a little momentum when the time frame advanced to modern day and the early efforts of Maria Altmann (Adele’s niece) to recover the paintings which had been stolen from her family. For some of the chapters in the last section of the book O’Connor switched to a first-person narrative, told from Maria’s point of view, and that seemed to interrupt the flow. Still, I was captivated from beginning to end.

[Paul · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had the great luck to see the two Gustav Klimt paintings of Adele Bloch-Bauer at the Oesterreichse Gallerie Belvedere in during my college years and vaguely followed the news about the US court case from the heirs of the original owners, so when I learned of this book, I picked it up immediately.

And the book does deliver on the title--we learn what happened to the portrait pictured on the cover, and the ensuing court case.

However, O'Connor also expanded the book to become a biography of those directly involved in the world of Bloch-Bauer and her heirs, which becomes completely and utterly confusing when the book reaches World War II. I coudn't keep track of the people she wrote about--who were the heirs and who were just friends of the Bloch-Bauers and met sad ends during the war.

That confusion took me out of the narrative, and took me out of what might have been a more gripping true-life story.

[Andrea · Rating 3 out of 5]

Oh poo. I was hoping to love this one more than I did. The Lady in Gold, as the subtitle suggests, is the story of the famous portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer by Gustav Klimt. The portrait itself is magnificent, so I was utterly intrigued. Did the book deliver? Meeeeh. I had several issues here:

1. History is not black and white. O'Connor sort of came across as this crusader on the mission that read "Jews - good, Austria - bad". Undeniably the Nazi party did horrendous things to the European population based on their race and background, but Austria wasn't divided clearly into Nazis and Jews. It's as if anybody who didn't resist the Nazis were evil supporters of Holocaust. How about the Austrians who hid Jews at the risk of their lives? How about Jews who sympathized with Germany's vision of dominance and growth until the genocide began? Austrians are all evil, all out to get the Jews, and museums that tried to save the art after the war were actually marauding criminals, racing against each other to satisfy their greed. Or at least that is the impression I got from reading The Lady in Gold. My stance on the topic is that history is a vast ocean filled with circumstance, personal passions, mistakes, chances, and survival. You cannot lump people into one pile based on their nationality, miss O'Connor. Oh wait, that's what the Nazis did. Let's learn from that.

2. The story deviates too much into brief biographies of multiple historical characters, and eventually you start losing track of who is who, and how they are related to the Bloch-Bauer portrait. There are chapters upon chapters of horrors of war, which again relate little about the art itself. Because of that the subtitle of the book is somewhat misleading. Considering that Klimt never discussed his private affairs and very few documents of Adele survived to present day, I should have expected that the much-speculated affair would not become any more clear after this book.

3. Too much speculation. The author imagines what goes though her subjects' heads as if this was fiction. How much of this can I attribute to the imagination of miss O'Connor and how much to her research, I don't know.

4. This is not the authors fault, but I hated the part when the five heirs were choosing what to do with the Klimt collection that was returned to them by the courts. Only one of them wanted to send the paintings to museums in Austria, so they could be enjoyed by the public as national treasure. The rest wanted to sell to private collectors. And then they have the audacity to claim it wasn't for money. "That's what Adele would have wanted", they say. She would want these paintings locked up in bedrooms of filthy rich magnates who see them purely as smart investment pieces? One of such paintings was sold to that guy who put his elbow through a Picasso. Yep, what a fate!

I did enjoy the description of pre-war Vienna, Klimt's liberated view of art, and Adele's short, but impactful life. Unfortunately, the book was bloated in places by unrelated trivia, and I disagreed with the author's stance on some issues. You win some, you lose some. Overall, an average kind of study of a famous masterpiece. I don't think I will be revisiting it anytime soon.

[Suzy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The power of art to tell a story, the power of art to influence and represent a culture, the power of art to create conflict yet also to heal and provide restitution. That is what this book is about to me.

The Lady in Gold is not so much about Klimt and it's not so much about the painting. Yes, it's about Klimt and the painting, but these are mainly jumping off points to tell the story of Vienna and the Jewish aristocracy which was so prominent and influential in Viennese culture at the turn of the 20th century. We also learn about the plight and fate of these Viennese Jews after WWI and before, during and after WWII and how WWI created a culture ripe for increased antisemitism and the acceptance of promise Hitler made to create a stable, prosperous, united Germany. The bulk of this book is devoted to telling these stories with the Bloch-Bauer family at the center.

Less of the book was about the niece of of Adele, Marie, and other heirs' efforts to gain back this painting and others that they believed were rightly theirs. This legal battle started in the late 90's and culminated successfully in the early 2000's.

I really liked this book and was riveted through most of it. Yet I must say I agree with some of the criticisms of others reviewers.
- The title does not represent what this book is about! See above :-)
- so many people's names to keep track of and remember who they were, how they were related and how they were relevant. A family tree would have been great.
- sometimes the vignettes jumped around in place and time making it hard to keep up and stay connected
- the author switched in the last part of the book from telling third person stories to writing in first person seemingly without warning. I kept wondering who "I" was when I realized it was her describing her interactions with the heirs and her experience in Vienna doing research.

Not wanting to end my review on a sour note, I highly recommend this book. O'Connor tells an important story and makes it interesting and creates at times heart-pounding suspense by putting people rather than facts at the center.

A movie based on the book, The Woman in Gold, is coming out April 3 starring Helen Mirren. I'm looking forward to it.

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book for lovers of art history and European history. The author takes you first to turn-of-the-century Vienna and introduces you to the painter, Gustav Klimt, and to Adele Bloch-Bauer, the subject, and her friends and family. Then you are taken on a journey with the painting and the family through World War I (and the end of the Austro-Hungarian Empire) and World War II (and the end, or the travails, of many of the Jews of Europe, including members of the Bloch-Bauer family and their friends--also the theft by the Nazis of many of the great works of art in private and public hands, including much of Klimt's work--this painting, too). Then you learn how the family tried to get the painting back from the government of Austria, which claimed it was given to that country's state art museum rather than "Aryanized" by the Nazis.

This book made me want to go to Vienna (if only I could go to Vienna in about 1910, that would be even better) and made me want to see this painting in person. My only wish was that the book included color plates of the paintings and other works described, in addition to its many black-and-white photos of the main characters. Although this book is not a comprehensive treatment of the Nazi art theft (see The Rape of Europa for that) or of the Holocaust or of Vienna's golden age, it is a well-written, engrossing treatment of all three together in the context of the biography of a beautiful painting.

[Marta · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love Klimt’s work but I admit I do not know much about him beyond being familiar with reproductions. This seemed like a fascinating work: exploring the relationship between Klimt and his model, the fascinating Jewish society celebrity, and the history of the painting itself. While the book explores these subjects, it is also a lot more - and somewhat less.

The book has three distinct parts. The first part was my favorite: an exploration of turn of the 19th and twentieth century Vienna, the life and art of Klimt, and that of Adele and the flourishing of a rich and culturally sophisticated Jewish middle and upper class. Vienna was a refuge and magnet of Jews at the time, and many arrived from all over Eastern Europe, opened up businesses, banks, took advantage of educational opportunities and became professionals like doctors, lawyers and scientists. Vienna’s Jewish population grew to about 10%, but they were much more represented in arts and culture: they were voracious theater goers, patrons of arts and music, hosts of large dinner parties and balls, and salons of intellectual discussion. They became Klimt’s main patrons when the traditional art institutions rejected his work, and he painted several portraits of Adele and many other Jewish people, mostly women.

This first part was highly interesting, especially the role of Jewish people, and the coexistence of acceptance and anti-semitism. There was much intermarriage, but also politicians who were eager to blame the Jews for all ills in time-honored European antisemitic tradition. This complicated relationship of Austrians with Jews and antisemitism has created a century long split personality and the tragedy of the Austrian Jews. I wished, however, that there was more about Klimt and Adele and their relationship. This section could have been more in-depth.

O’Connor spends more time on the second and third part. The second part is largely an account of the terrible atrocities committed against Jews and the horrible fates of those who did not escape. The switch from a golden life to abject humiliation and death is sudden and complete, and we witness it in various family members and friends of Adele as well as other Austrian Jews. I was not prepared for the length and detail of this section. I have read about them, saw documentaries and been to Buchenwald - these are the most horrific crimes humanity has committed and it is difficult to fathom humans being able to do this to other humans. It shakes me every time to the core. In the context of this book, however, this took way too much time, had way too much detail, and worse, it covered so many different family members that it was difficult to keep track of who was who, and it was simply too long and tool detailed. (For example, there was no need to cite about 10 letters of Frederick and Louise when they were roughly the same each time.)

The third section covers the legal battle to recover the paintings, and the schizophrenic Austrian relationship to their part in Nazism, and the covering up of the past. I found the exploration of pretended amnesia very interesting and insightful, however the legal proceedings were overly lengthy and should have been about a third as long.

I had some qualms about the writing devices, too. Parts of this read very much like fiction: O’Connor conjures up scenes, complete with details and emotions she has no way of knowing. She puts in details that distract from the story instead of enhancing it.

I was listening, and my audio was too fast. The narrator sounded like she was speaking out of breath and was eating up words. I finally figured out it was sped up: at 90% speed, she sounded natural. However, her German pronunciation was atrocious: I barely recognized well-known cities and names. You’d think if you were to read a book full of German names, you would at least look up a basic pronunciation guide. Even if you have an accent, it is much better to try than just read them like they were in English.

Overall, interesting subject but too much detail, too much fiction, and an ignorant narrator.

[Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a fascinating book with a cast of thousands that is sometimes hard to keep track of—and I am impressed that the author was able to keep all the complicated details in order. More than just the story of a famous painting, THE LADY IN GOLD covers:
*the art of Gustav Klimt and other Austrian artists both before, during and after the Nazi era
*the rich artistic culture in Austria before the war
*how deeply involved many Jewish Austrians were as artists, models and art patrons and collectors
*how World War II decimated the Austrian Jewish community
*the ways Austria cooperated with the Nazis both in “ridding the country” of people of Jewish descent, and in confiscating the art collections of Jewish citizens
*how up until recently, the Austrian government not only refused to admit its collaboration with the Nazis, but a younger generation has called for truth-telling and reparations
*how many Nazi functionaries from Hitler on down stole 20% of the artworks of Europe and hid them in bunkers and castles and mines
*that until a feisty Austrian refugee took legal action against the Austrian government, most Jewish people who had escaped Nazi Austria had not received their “captured” art, homes, businesses or other holdings back

There are numerous paintings I will never look at in quite the same way since I now know the human cost behind the paintings.

[Carlton Phelps · Rating 5 out of 5]

I knew the painting from the movie about the family fighting to get the Austrian government to return the painting. Which was stolen by the Natzis during their occupation of the country.
That being said, this book tells the entire story behind this Klimt painting as well as other priceless painting masterpieces stolen from Jewish people by Nazis.
At the end of the war many of the paintings, including this one, were "gifted" by Nazi Austrians to museums that claimed they have every right to keep these national treasures.
As written in the book, many Austrians either deny they were Nazis or that any of the paintings and other artworks, were theirs to keep. Even though they knew how their families came to own the Jewish works of art.
There is plenty of historical background about Vienna before and during the occupation. As well as the history of the families that went from loved to hated.
I was disgusted to read about how the Austrian government denied that the paintings belonged to the families they were stolen from, knowing how many of the families were killed in concentration camps.
Well worth your time to read this book. It is well-written and attention to detail is wonderful.

[Jeanette · Rating 4 out of 5]

No review on this one, just a short reaction. This is far more than just the tale of a painting and its artist / subject. It holds a cast of 1000's and highlights the incredible Vienna of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. So many factors of advance and philosophy, apart from the politico forming. Art, science, and myriad paths followed by the affluent and in golden age serendipity to meeting towards a pinnacle. It's an extremely difficult read and the dozens of photos and other asides helped to understand the process and also the aftermath of power and idea. Not only in the administrative or criminal justice process but in the spirit of origin and subsequent discoveries and associative descendants.

[Stephanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I suspect that most people are familiar with Gustav Klimt's "Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer" the modernist painting of the heavy-lidded dark-haired woman surrounded by a shimmering mosaic of gold. I picked up the book expecting nothing more than a further elaboration on the subject's heirs successful international legal battle to recover the artwork. Yet, the title of the book does not do justice to the scope of O'Connor's exhaustively researched and detailed work.

O'Connor opens the book with alternating chapters detailing Klimt and Bloch-Bauer's backgrounds. Klimt was born into an impoverished family, but he had talent and a powerful sexual magnetism that attracted women at the highest levels of Viennese society (and led to a number of illegitimate children). Bloch-Bauer married a prominent industrialist and, childless, she established a glittering salon of Viennese intellectuals and artists. Although Klimt was viewed as a heretic in his time, he received many portrait commissions from progressive and wealthy Austrian Jews. Bloch-Bauer and Klimt had a close association for many years (and perhaps an affair), and she was the subject of the famous painting that Austrian's view as their "Mona Lisa."

The second part of the book, which this reader found to be the most successful, picks up in 1937 after the deaths of Klimt in 1918 and Bloch-Bauer in 1925. O'Connor captures the fear of the Jewish Viennese aristocracy against the rise of anti-semitism. The book is gripping in drama as Jewish families are destroyed and their businesses, homes, and art collections are confiscated by Nazis. The portrait, stripped of its subject's Jewish identity by being renamed "Dame in Gold," was stored in a former monastery during the war and was taken to the Belvedere which enhanced its collection through the Nazi's "uncommonly prolific acquisition policy."

The third part of the book chronicles repetent Viennese, such as Hubertus Czernin, a Viennese investigative journalist, who could not recover lives lost but could report on Autria's complicity in the Holocaust and led the cry to return stolen artwork to its murdered and wronged Jewish citizens. It also details the legal battles of Bloch-Bauer's neice, Maria, who was able to gain her husband's release from Dachua in exchange for family assets. Maria and her husband escaped Vienna and, with the help of a young, inexperienced lawyer who took the case on a contigency basis, successfully sued Austria in U.S. courts for the return of her aunt's portrait.

O'Connor presents an enormous amount of information, some of which is peripheral to her subject, but it is all fascinating and makes for a compelling tale of art and the Holocaust.

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was one of the selections for my in-person book club. When it was selected I assumed it would be more like Girl With a Pearl Earring or Girl in Hyacinth Blue, novelizations of the story of how a painting was made.

That is not what this book is. It is a non-fiction account of one painting and others, from when Klimt was alive up into the 21st century with the legal battle removing the painting from the Belvedere in Vienna and giving it to descendents of the woman in the painting.

I have to admit to enjoying the first third of the book the most. It focuses on the time of the painting and of the artist. I was fascinated by the Vienna of the early 20th century and the character of Klimt. There were quite a few paintings of his I'd never heard of, and other artists that were unfamiliar. I spent a lot of time looking up images of these paintings, since the book only had black and white photos.

The majority of the book, the second section, tells the story of the painting in the context of World War II. It suffers from not presenting any new information in the bigger facts (art was stolen from Jewish families before they were killed or pushed out of the country, the Holocaust, etc.), but also suffers from too much detail in following all the minor characters even tangentially related to the story. It would have been stronger to focus in.

The last section follows the very recent legal battle and points to a culture of denial in Vienna after the war that allowed stolen property to remain the property of the state. I didn't realize how recent much of the art restitution movements had been, particularly in Austria. Even the Looted Art Commission has only been around since 1999.

[Rebecca Budd · Rating 5 out of 5]

“The Lady in Gold” is a brilliant testament to why I have chosen to read non-fiction. Anne-Marie O’Connor transported me to the glittering world of the Viennese Belle Époque, the beautiful era which began in the 1870’s and ended at the beginning of WWI. There I met Gustav Klimt and other brilliant artists, musicians and writers who embodied the Secession motto: “Der Zeit ihre Kunst. Der Kunst ihre Freiheit.” (“To every age its art. To every art its freedom.”) This was the world of Adele Bloch-Bauer, The Lady in Gold.

Anne-Marie O’Connor is a masterful storyteller. She weaves personal narratives against the backdrop of a fragile world of unimaginable wealth, political upheaval and a monarchy in transition. The greatest story centers on the 1907 painting by Gustav Klimt: Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer. It was a three-year labor of love, commissioned by Adele’s husband, Ferdinand Block-Bauer. What was meant to adorn the wall of an elegant family home, was coveted by others who recognized the genius behind “The Lady in Gold”

The Lady in Gold holds the memorable stories of many who desired its beauty. It is a reminder of the vulnerability of life, the unforeseen circumstances that intrude into our seemingly impenetrable, carefully constructed worlds. The enigmatic Klimt and the beautiful Adele may have passed into history, but their lives are enshrined in a painting that endures.
https://ontheroadbookclub.com/2016/11...

[CatReader · Rating 3 out of 5]

In 2012's The Lady in Gold, journalist Anne-Marie O'Connor tells a long, meandering story about one of Austrian painter Gustav Klimt's best known works, 1907's Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I (also known as the Lady in Gold, as reflected in the book's title). TL;DR: the painting's subject, Adele Bloch-Bauer (1881-1925) was a wealthy Austrian Jewish woman who modeled for Klimt several times and may have also slept with him (Klimt was notorious for sleeping with and impregnating his young female models), and this painting in particular was commissioned by the Bloch-Bauer family shortly after Adele Bauer's socially-engineered marriage into the Bloch dynasty as a status symbol that many high society families at the time indulged in. While Adele died quite young, at only 43 in 1925, and had no direct heirs of her own, the painting fell into Nazi hands during World War II (being rebranded as the Lady in Gold to distract from Adele's Jewish heritage), with Adele's surviving family members often losing everything (including their lives), though several managed to escape the region. In the early 2000s, legal challenges by Adele's surviving relatives (though the family was divided in sentiment) led to this artwork and several others belonging to the Bloch-Bauers being re-appropriated to Adele's family in a high profile legal case that dovetailed with the larger conversation about Nazi stolen art, which they promptly sold for massive profit. The Lady in Gold is on display at the Neue Galerie in New York City while most other works are in private collections -- such is the way with much art.

The book itself is around 300 pages of dense text, tracing dozens of tangents in addition to the main narrative. It's clear O'Connor researched it extensively, including many interviews with Adele's relatives who were involved in the re-appropriation process. I was interested in parts and bored in others, and wish that this book would have been pared down to focus on the central story and talk about the painting itself more (technical details, art history, etc.).

My statistics:
Book 40 for 2025
Book 1966 cumulatively

[Greg · Rating 4 out of 5]

UPDATE: I recently checked this film out of the library again and thought it great the 2nd time around. It seemed like the film offered more in the area of the social life of Klimt and life in Vienna at the time this painting appeared on the scene: perhaps the movie brought specific ideas into better light by focusing on them more deeply and others less. A case of relativity? There is just a handful of movies that improve upon the book: Stephen King's "Carrie" and "The Shining" are 2 of them. (Is it the horror visuals?) Another is Kubrick's film masterpiece, "2001: A Space Odyssey", one of my favorites of all time but I found the book simply unmemorable. Since I've mentioned a certain director 2 times, perhaps it's a "Kubrick Effect". Then there is Hitchcock's "Psycho", also better than Bloch's book. I've returned to the 'horror effect' and there are scenes in "Psycho" (and that score) so deeply buried in my brain that the book didn't come close to the film: Hitchcock batted that one out of the park.

ORIGINAL:
When I visited the Belvedere Museum in Vienna, I first reviewed the brochure at the ticket booth. To my great surprise, there it was, Klimt's "The Kiss", and I asked the lady selling tickets if this work was really on display. (Is it possible that I was about to see the real thing, having spent years with images of this ubiquitous work?) She smiled and nodded proudly. Then I ask about the "one with the lady surrounded by gold." Her smile disappeared, she completed our transaction quickly, then waved the next customer forward. And now I know why she reacted as she did. O'Connor writes, "What is the value of a painting that has come to evoke the theft of six million lives?" With a brilliant combination of mysterious art-theft elements (as in "The Goldfinch") and intense personal WW2 stories (as in "All the Light We Cannot See"), this author tells a true story in a style that's far more interesting than both of the aforementioned books combined, and both of those won a Pulitzer. Why not this? Could it be there are people in the world today haunted by the actions of their families, their ancestors, so much so they just don't want this story told? Absolutely! I do not recall this case in which the US Supreme Court battles with Vienna over this art work. If you don't either, you're in for a truly thrilling story. My advice? Don't read the book flaps, know nothing, and dive right in to this miraculous tale.

[Kristie Kercheval · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you enjoy art history or would enjoy WWII European History, you'll enjoy The Lady in Gold. My memory of learning about Gustav Klimt as a freshman in college was that he was a this jerk who lived a dissipated life, dying an early death. His overall contribution to Modern Art was not as significant as other artists at the same time, and we only briefly considered his work.

This book changed my viewpoint on Klimt's work. I thought it was interesting that he got his inspiration for his later paintings after a visit to Ravenna where he saw the Byzantine mosaics of Empress Theodora and that influenced his painting of Adele. I've never seen this painting, but I imagine it is amazing as it is personal.

Behind every portrait is a real person, and the stories of the people surrounding Klimt are as rich and complex as the gold leaf woven into his paintings. There is a dark side to his work that represents a civilized society that only a short time later after his death was welcoming the Third Reich with open arms. It is incredible that not only were Jewish families plundered of all their assets practically overnight, but that the Austrian government held on to stolen art over 60 years later with little apology. Anne-Marie O'Conner does an incredible job bringing us the drama of how these paintings ended up back with their rightful owners.

[Mary Margaret · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wow, I really slogged through this one. This is because it was some heavy subject matter, but also because it took a lot of concentration to keep from getting immensely lost.

I think the most frustrating thing is that the book really sells itself as being the story of Adele Bloch-Bauer, her portrait, her relationship to Klimt, and how the painting was stolen and returned. There is so very much more in this book, though, and I got so lost in all the information.

There are SO many people talked about in this book, and it is overwhelming. Keeping up with who is who and how each person is related to the main topic is quite tricky. A lot of people who are included in the book are not given an explanation for their inclusion until the end of the book.
I did really appreciate how this book made me think a lot about the ethics of art purchasing, displays, and how the subjects of works of art are discussed. I also appreciated the insight it gave me into Vienna, a place I knew little about, prior to this book.

I didn’t realize how much I didn’t like the artist Klimt as a person. What a stinky man! The story about Mitzi really made me angry.

I think this is a valuable book, overall, and I am glad I read it.
However, due to the confusion and the excessive detail, I give this book 3 and a 1/2 stars.

[Lauri · Rating 2 out of 5]

The tale is indeed extraordinary, but not portrayed very well in this book. I was really disappointed - the writing was disjointed and hard to follow.

[Sofija Popović · Rating 4 out of 5]

Prikaz na portalu Sinhro ⬇️

https://sinhro.rs/dama-u-zlatnom-blis...

[The Book Jar Blog · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read more of our reviews at: www.thebookjarblog.wordpress.com

The Lady In Gold is the story of Gustav Klimt's portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer, a wealthy Jewish-Austrian woman who's family was forced to flee during the Nazi occupation. The Bloch-Bauer family were once prominent, wealthy people in the Austrian society who were patrons of art and theater. Klimt had been commissioned to paint Adele for her husband Ferdinand, and from this commission, the Lady in Gold. However, the painting's history and the history of the Block-Bauer's were erased once the Nazi's took over. Maria was Adele's niece, and she was desperate to get back the few items left that belong to her family, this painting was one of them. The Austrian government refused and Maria decided to sue.

I picked up this book because I wanted to read the story before I saw the movie, Woman in Gold. The story is a complicated tale of the history of the Nazi occupation and the Austrian's government desire to ignore their compliance during the occupation. O'Conner gives a rich history of the Bloch-Bauer family that is fascinating and also confusing, I felt some of the details that O'Conner gave could have been left out to help the story move faster. She did a great job explaining the history of Klimt, the Bloch-Bauer family and the Nazi occupation, but I felt she left out some of the most crucial parts of the story. 2/3 of the story was devoted to history, and only 1/3 was actually devoted to Marie and her desire to obtain the painting. I would've liked to have read more about Marie, her life after fleeing Austria and the legal case of suing the Austrian government for the painting. If you want to read about Klimt, prominent Jewish families in Austrian society and the Nazi occupation in Austria, this is the book for you. If you want to read about the legal case of the Lady In Gold painting, look elsewhere. 3/5

[Colleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

You don't have to become an art expert, but you have to know what is genuine, what style is. You have to learn to see. You have to develop a feeling for quality. Once you have learned to enjoy the great works of art, the plastic arts and literature, then you will be able to evaluate people, whether they are valuable or worthless.

Happy he who forgets what cannot be changed.

Only the person who places the highest demands on himself can progress one step further. Self-satisfied individuals are incapable of development.

To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.

A talent is formed in stillness, a character in the mainstream of the world.

Beware of criticizing things and conditions that you have no idea about or are unfamiliar to you. Beware of being disrespectful! You have to be thorough in everything!

To Strauss the composer I take off my hat, to Strauss the man I put it back on again.

Any nonsense can attain importance by virtue of being believed by millions of people.

If humans, now that at long last it has become obvious that money is dirt, they do not deserve for money to be dirt.

One will always forget the days passing, in the midst of the effort and the beauty of the present day, and the hope of the unforeseen in the days to come.

Has not everything that we give already lost its way when it is not transformed into help or love?

Even as a young girl, I had the feeling I 'stood above the mob'.

Think, dear friend, reflect on the world you carry within yourself. (A fellow soul-seeker)

Randy was convinced he was absolutely right. I had met few people in my life so certain of this.

The arc of life is long, but it tends towards justice.

[Hank Stuever · Rating 5 out of 5]

Disclosure: Anne-Marie O'Connor is a friend of mine, but I have to just add a few words here to say how much I admire the way she's synthesized all this material into a gripping story of people, art, human nature (the worst kind), war, memory, recompense. There is something on every page that surprises -- the sort of facts and tangents that a more narrow account might have edited out, but that beautifully illuminate the larger story to be told here. You can tell this book was carefully written and that every sentence was thoughtfully considered, researched and arranged. The short-chapter organization and illustrations are a masterful way to usher the reader through a story that takes a century to play out. I don't read a lot of art history or true tales of museum shenanigans and lost treasures very much. But I have to say I was addicted to this one.

[Donald Schopflocher · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story of the portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer by Gustav Klimt has everything: a charismatic artist, a passionate love affair at the end of the Belle Epoque, the theft of the family’s possessions by Nazis, the effort to restore the painting to the Bloch-Bauer family, the resistance of the Austrian government to restitution for war losses, and the astounding valuation of the family’s recovered art collection as sold upon its recovery. The author presents a broad context, but unfortunately her telling is too often disjointed, and sometimes meandering and repetitive.

[Bączur · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5 nie wiem co mam o niej myśleć. Totalne spodziewałam się czegoś innego

[Leah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really fascinating. Read this whilst in Vienna, and it really affected how I saw things here.

[AltLovesBooks · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm unsatisfied, and I feel like the book title and premise misrepresented what it ended up being about. The beginning was promising, and I really enjoyed the picture the author painted (heh heh) of pre-war Vienna and the sorts of people it attracted. The depictions of Adele, Klimt, and all their associated friends and flings were interesting. From there, though, the book rushed its way to World War II and then spun its wheels there while it tried to tell short little stories of anyone who had even a tenuous connection to the painting or Adele or Klimt, and their experiences with World War II. It felt like half the book was stuck here, and I ended up getting really fatigued at reading Nazi story after Nazi story. It also felt like the painting, what I thought was the subject of the book, was mentioned very little during this section.

The book then sped up again, speeding us along to what I was expecting more of -- the actual fight for the painting. Or so I thought, anyway, the legal battle ended up spanning only a small handful of chapters (and the chapters in this book are only a page or two), and then it was over and Maria had won her fight. The rest of the book was Vienna's complaints about the paintings being purchased.

I like a good non-fiction book about random historical topics, but this one didn't feel like it fit the bill for me. It lacked direction and cohesion, because while the people stories were for the most part interesting, I never had a clear idea of where one thought was leading to the next. It also lacked substance about the actual painting beyond what was told pre-WWII, which is a letdown considering the book title implied more. This one missed the mark with me, I think.